EXCHANGE 


IDEALISTIC  BEGINNINGS 
IN  ENGLAND 


BY 

JOHN  PICKETT  TURNER,  A.  M. 


Submitted  in  Partial  Fulfilment  of  the  Requirements 

for  the  Degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy 

in  the  Faculty  of  Philosophy, 

Columbia  University 


1910 


IDEALISTIC  BEGINNINGS 
IN  ENGLAND 


BY 
JOHN  PICKETT  TURNER,  A.  M. 


Submitted  in  Partial  Fulfilment  of  the  Requirements 

for  the  Degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy 

in  the  Faculty  of  Philosophy, 

Columbia  University 


1910 


PREFACE. 

Whether  any  excuse  should  be  offered  for  going 
into  a  period  that  has  so  often  been  the  object  of 
inquiry  on  the  part  of  more  experienced  students, 
is  left  for  the  reader  of  the  following  studies  to 
decide,  but  a  word  as  to  the  genesis  of  the  paper 
cannot  be  out  of  place.  It  began  in  an  inquiry 
into  the  signification  of  the  term  imagination  in 
earlier  English  writers.  This  was  found  to  be  a 
trustworthy  index  of  the  several  philosophers'  po- 
sitions in  psychology.  Interesting  light  was 
thrown  upon  the  beginnings  of  idealism.  With 
the  English  germs  of  idealism  so  completely  laid 
bare,  it  has  been  thought  worth  while  to  retrace 
the  study  with  especial  reference  to  that  move- 
ment. In  tracing  this  gradual  development  of 
and  continued  emphasis  upon  the  synthetic  func- 
tion of  mind,  it  has  been  thought  relevant  to  the 
study  to  keep  watch  upon  the  formal  explanation 
of  union  as  well  as  the  explanation  that  must 
underlie  the  description  given  by  each  author. 
Hence  the  importance  of  and  attention  given  to 
the  principle  of  association  in  these  studies.  That 
these  studies  have  been  made  from  the  stand-point 
of  physiological  psychology,  is  too  apparent  to 
call  for  the  statement. 


The  labor  of  carrying  out  any  thorough  study 
of  Hobbes  has  been  greatly  lightened  since  the 
appearance  of  Professor  Woodbridge's  compila- 
tion of  selections  from  his  writings.1  I  take  this 
opportunity  to  acknowledge  the  great  usefulness 
of  this  volume,  from  which  for  the  most  part  my 
quotations  are  taken,  and  my  indebtedness  to  its 
author.  In  the  case  of  Berkeley  and  Locke  the 
editions  of  Professor  A.  C.  Fraser  were  used, 
while  in  the  case  of  Hume  that  of  Professor  L.  A. 
Selbe-Bigge. 


The  Philosophy  of  Hobbes.  1903. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE. 

Preface   5_6 

Introduction    11-15 

I  Hobbes :  Dogmatic  Materialism 19-49 

II  Locke :  Open-minded  Dualism 53-81 

III  Berkeley:  Dogmatic  Spiritualism 85-103 

IV  Hume :  Critical  Positivism 107-129 

Conclusion 133-4 


INTRODUCTION. 


INTRODUCTION. 

The  reception  accorded  Sterling's  The  Secret  of 
Hegel,  the  epoch-making  character  of  which  all 
freely  admit,  has  usually  been  explained  as  a  re- 
action against  the  doctrines  of  Spencer,  Huxley 
and  other  espousers  of  the  evolutionary  hypothe- 
sis. But  it  is  a  far  more  significant  fact  that  the 
whole  transcendental  movement  was  in  its  origin 
a  reaction  against  the  advance  of  science.  The 
germanization  of  British  thought  is  a  topic  of 
local  importance,  but  the  beginnings  of  idealism 
arouses  a  more  general  interest.  The  present 
paper  undertakes  to  trace  the  first  crude  steps  of 
this  movement  which,  beginning  with  Hobbes  end- 
ed in  the  philosophy  of  Kant.  While  an  endless 
amount  of  work  has  been  put  upon  the  transition 
from  the  English  school  to  Kant,  it  has  been  done 
in  a  broad  way  and  has  rarely  devoted  itself  to 
psychology,  as  is  the  case  with  this  paper.  The 
gradual  development  of  the  idealistic  mind  in 
England  has  been  neglected.  While  the  present 
paper  necessarily  brings  into  relief  this  aspect  of 
the  English  school,  it  must  be  at  once  understood 
that  the  writer  does  not  lose  sight  of  the  direct 
line  of  the  school — a  phase  of  the  subject  that  has 
not  been  neglected — just  as  Kant's  continental 
antecedents  have  not  been  forgotten.  But  it  is 
maintained  that  the  developments  in  England  con- 


12  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

stitute  the  best  explanation  of  how  Kantianism 
came  to  be. 

While  Bacon  had  done  much  to  arouse  thinking 
men,  the  philosophy  of  Hobbes  constitutes  the 
first  systematic  break  of  modern  thought  with 
the  past;  what  is  wanting  in  Bacon  is  found  in 
Hobbes, — a  clear  statement  of  his  case.  The 
Baconian  division  between  science  and  religion 
was  reasserted  by  Hobbes  and  so  extended  as  to 
enable  him  to  treat  as  relevant  to  his  investiga- 
tion only  the  world  of  sensuous  experience.  His 
statement,  if  dogmatic,  was  at  least  clear  and  his 
position  unwavering.  The  work  of  Locke,  on  the 
other  hand,  tho'  it  has  long  been  regarded  as 
epoch-making  by  reason  of  its  radical  character, 
marks  a  distinct  return  to  the  past  in  some  re- 
spects. His  general  attitude  towards  mind,  de- 
spite his  much  written  of  sensationalism  was, 
when  all  is  considered,  of  a  reactionary  colour. 
While  Hobbes  declared  for  an  absolutely  homo- 
geneous universe,  Locke  in  an  unmistakable  man- 
ner opposed  mind  to  matter  and  introduced  an 
intervening  world  of  ideas.  Altho  the  distinc- 
tion between  mind  and  matter  was  not  so  rigid  as 
that  of  Cartesian  dualism,  this  leaning  towards 
Plato  does  not  harmonize  well  with  his  Hobbistic 
sensational  psychology  which  Locke  has  had  the 
credit  of  re-asserting.  Where  Hobbes  had  in  a 
clear  and  unmistakable  manner  decried  a  faculty 
— psychology.  Locke  in  just  as  unmistakable  a 
manner  restores  a  new  set  of  faculties,  called  by 


INTRODUCTION.  13 

him  powers,  or  natural  faculties,  by  the  use  of 
which  a  directing  and  active  mind  gets  into  touch 
with  and  systematizes  sensuous  experience.  The 
Lockean  attitude  may  be  easily  explained.  While 
accepting  certain  new  theories,  his  openness  of 
mind  forbade  his  neglecting  certain  old  ones  re- 
garded as  yet  to  be  overthrown.  Such  a  com- 
promising position  on  the  part  of  Locke  was  but 
a  goad  to  Berkeley,  who  completed  the  reaction 
implicit  in  Locke's  teachings.  His  return  to  the 
past  was  at  least  novel.  In  his  psychological 
idealism  he  crossed  by  way  of  a  consideration  of 
primary  and  secondary  qualities  into  a  one-world 
theory  all  his  own,  which  tho'  directly  opposed  to, 
had  many  points  in  common  with,  that  of  Hobbes. 
As  in  the  case  of  Hobbes  his  position  was  a  dog- 
matic one,  but  remarkable  for  its  consistency. 
Starting  with  Hobbes-Lockean  sensationalism,  de- 
veloping Locke's  signification  of  idea,  he  re-in- 
terprets the  doctrine  in  such  a  way  as  to  destroy 
its  meaning;  what  in  his  two  predecessors  had 
vouchsafed  an  external  world  independent  of  mind, 
became  for  him  nothing  more  than  the  operation 
of  mind.  His  alliance  with  sensationalism  prov- 
ed to  be  but  a  mask  for  the  restoration  of  mind. 
The  scholastic  faculty  of  will,  which  Hobbes  had 
successfully  discarded,  is  restored  and  more, — it 
becomes  for  Berkeley  the  essence  of  orig- 
inal and  active  mind,  marking  off  individu- 
als from  each  other.  Hume,  who  extend- 
ed the  same  doctrine  into  the  realm  of  mind, 


14  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

carried  Berkeley  to  his  implicit  conclusion. 
He  reasoned  that  if  sensuous  experience 
does  not  signify  an  external  world  independent 
of  mind,  then  there  is  no  proof  that  subjective  ex- 
perience signifies  mind,  the  inner  world.  All  we 
have  of  a  certainty  are  two  streams  of  experience ; 
what  the  uniting  principle  of  our  experience  is,  is 
an  insoluble  mystery.  As  the  materialism  of 
Hobbes  had  been  replaced  by  a  dualism  of  the 
Cartesian  type  by  Locke,  so  the  spiritualism  of 
Berkeley  is  replaced  by  the  Humean  dualism  of 
experience.  So,  too,  as  the  dogmatic  position 
taken  by  Hobbes  had  been  followed  by  the  more 
openminded  Locke,  the  dogmatic  position  taken  by 
Berkeley  had  been  followed  by  the  still  more  open- 
minded  Hume.  In  assuming  this  non-committal 
position,  declaring  only  for  the  existence  of 
two  streams  of  experience,  Hume  took  the 
step  that  rendered  Kantianism  a  possibility. 
While  trying  to  destroy  prejudice  in  favor  of  an 
ordered  external  world,  such  as  we  fancy  that  we 
have  about  us,  Hume  emphasized  very  significant- 
ly the  part  that  the  mind  plays  in  giving  continuity 
to  our  experience  of  nature.  The  balance  was 
thus  tilted  in  favor  of  mind  for  Kant,  although 
there  can  be  little  doubt  of  Hume's  leaning  to  a 
mechanistic  interpretation  of  nature.  If  Hume's 
attack  upon  the  causal  principle  aroused  Kant 
from  his  dogmatic  slumber,  the  Humean  emphasis 
upon  mental  creations  suggested  the  way  out  to 
him,  while  the  significant,  if  loose,  Humean  use 


INTRODUCTION.  15 

of  the  term  imagination  gave  the  cue  to  him  that 
enabled  him  to  bring  into  closer  union  perception 
and  conception.  In  a  larger  sense,  therefore,  it 
made  possible  the  significant  claim  of  the  critical 
philosophy  to  bring  harmony  into  the  opposing 
schools  of  empiricism  and  rationalism.  For  Kant 
really  did  little  more  than  give  a  systematic  de- 
fense of  Hume's  position. 


I. 

HOBBES:   DOGMATIC  MATERIALISM. 


HOBBES:  DOGMATIC  MATERIALISM. 

That  Hobbes  was  for  many  years  the  most 
hated  man  in  all  England,  is  a  fact  far  from  in- 
significant, even  for  psychology.  For  although 
his  labor  in  this  field  was  incidental  to  his  work 
in  political  science,  it  constitutes  a  break  with 
the  past  the  effects  of  which  are  felt  to-day.  To 
him  as  much  as  to  any  other  one  man  is  due  the 
loss  of  prestige  suffered  by  the  ancient  doctrine 
of  innate  ideas.  Greek  intellectualism  met  for 
the  first  time,  in  his  psychology,  the  instrument 
that  may  yet  play  havoc  with  it  and  physiological 
psychology  became  a  possibility.  For  while  what 
he  did  in  psychology  has  its  shortcomings  from 
the  standpoint  of  neurology,  examined  in  the 
light  of  the  advancement  of  the  science  of  physi- 
ology in  his  day,  his  contributions  are  nothing 
less  than  remarkable. 

It  is  well,  however,  to  call  attention  at  the  out- 
set to  the  relation  that  Hobbes  sustained  to  the 
intuitionalists;  for  unless  this  be  borne  constant- 
ly in  mind,  his  treatment  of  mind  may  seem  one- 
sided. Hobbes,  as  is  the  case  with  all  sensation- 
alists, in  combating  innate  ideas  went  to  the 
other  extreme.  This  will  help  us  to  understand 
why  it  is  that  Hobbes  lays  so  much  emphasis 


20  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

upon  the  conservative  aspect  of  mind,  which  in 
the  light  of  his  unbounded  confidence  in  the 
power  of  mind,  may  seem  undue. 

Before  entering  upon  his  long  career  as  writer 
and  thinker,  Hobbes  had  already  come  to  the  con- 
clusion that  consciousness  is  dependent  upon 
change.  As  he  afterwards  wrote: 

"To  be  always  sensible  of  one  and  the  same  thing,  and 
not  to  be  sensible  at  all  of  anything  is  almost  all  one." 

If  now  consciousness  exists,  which  Hobbes 
does  not  question,  it  is  explicable  in  terms  of 
change.  Here  Hobbes  turns  to  Galileo  whose 
theory  of  motion  certainly  suited  his  needs. 
Change  is  motion  essentially;  that  is  a  fact  be- 
yond question.  'That  all  mutation  consists  in 
motion',  is  for  Hobbes  a  general  truth,  not  ac- 
cepted only  by  those  whose  ' natural  discourse 
has  been  corrupted  with  former  opinions  re- 
ceived from  their  masters  and  who  have  not  bent 
their  minds  to  the  inquiring  out  of  truth '.(1) 

To  pass  thus  from  Galileo  to  Hobbes  is  but  a 
step;  change  in  the  mind  is  in  its  essence  what 
change  in  nature  is,  motion.  Sensation  "is  noth- 
ing but  motion  in  some  internal  part  of  the  sen- 
tient ".  The  world  within  the  mind  no  less  than 
the  world  without  the  mind  is  a  world  of  motion ; 
the  " internal  parts",  or  the  "fluids",  of  the  body 
are  in  constant  motion  as  well  as  the  external 


*)  Elements  of  Philosophy.  Chapter  VI,  Par.  5. 


HOBBES:    DOGMATIC    MATERIALISM.  21 

world.  Here  we  come  to  the  key  to  Hobbes' 
system.  From  the  above  quotation  it  can  easily 
be  seen  that  for  Hobbes  the  one  indisputable  fact 
is  that  all  change  is  a  manifestation  of  motion. 
Prom  his  own  significant  observation  that  con- 
sciousness depends  upon  change,  reinforced  by 
the  teachings  of  Galileo,  Hobbes  leaps  to  the 
center  of  his  whole  metaphysical  system,  that 
motion  is  the  one  reality,  the  cause  of  all  things 
that  are,  with  no  cause  but  itself.  From  this  uni- 
versal he  then  proceeds  in  rigorous  fashion  to 
make  his  deductions.  But  despite  his  great  con- 
fidence in  the  deductive  method,  Hobbes  still 
makes  valuable  contributions  to  the  subject  of 
psychology,  as  we  shall  soon  see. 

The  student  of  Hobbes'  psychology,  then,  must 
approach  it  through  the  concept  of  motion;  the 
technique  that  Galileo  applied  to  physics  is  to  be 
intensified  and  applied  to  mind  and  its  relation  to 
the  external  world.  When  a  body  is  presented  to 
the  senses  of  a  sentient  creature  such  as  man,  it 
by  its  own  motion  sets  in  motion  the  internal  parts 
of  the  creature  counter  to  which  is  the  motion 
from  within  (which  for  our  author  explains  that 
appearance  of  outness  that  all  our  phantasms 
have)  and  there  arises  concomitantly  with  this 
motion  and  reaction  the  phantasm  called  sense, 
the  persistence  of  which  is  called  an  image 
or  fancy.  The  persistence  of  the  im- 
age is  accounted  for  by  the  fundamental 


22  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS  IN   ENGLAND. 

laws  of  motion.  Now,  it  is  just  these  im- 
ages, gained  from  sense,  maintained  accord- 
ing to  the  laws  of  motion,  that  constitute  what 
is  known  as  mind;  for  images  are  the  irreducible* 
element  of  the  thinking  process.  Thus  Hobbes  re- 
places a  mind  filled  with  innate  ideas  with  a  mind 
of  moving  images  not  inborn,  but  gained  from  ex- 
perience. And  instead  of  a  mind  that  goes  out 
and  by  means  of  forms  comprehends  objects,  such 
as  Ralph  Cudworth  and  other  Platonists  defended, 
we  have  as  mind  a  moving  sea  of  images  that  con- 
stitute the  register  of  past  experience. 

And  here  we  come  to  the  significant  aspect  of 
mind  for  Hobbes,  the  mind  as  the  conservator  of 
experience.  Nothing  brings  this  out  better  than 
his  discussion  of  the  imagination,  which  is  the 
most  fundamental  term  used  by  Hobbes  in  his 
treatment  of  mental  phenomenona.  To  cite  his 
words : 

"For  after  the  object  is  removed,  or  the  eye  shut,  we 
still  retain  an  image  of  the  thing  seen,  though  more 
obscure  than  when  we  see  it.  And  this  is  it,  the  Latins 
call  the  imagination,  from  the  image  made  in  seeing;  and 
apply  the  same,  though  improperly,  to  all  other  senses. 
But  the  Greeks  call  it  fancy;  which  signifies  appearance, 
and  is  as  proper  to  one  sense,  as  to  another.  IMAGINATION 
therefore  is  nothing  but  decaying  sense:  and  is  found  in 
men,  and  many  other  living  creatures,  as  well  sleeping, 
as  waking.  The  decay  of  sense  in  men  waking,  is  not 
the  decay  of  motion  made  in  the  sense;  but  the  obscuring 
of  it,  in  such  manner  as  the  light  of  the  sun  obscureth  the 
light  of  the  stars  *  *  *  And  any  object  being  removed 
from  our  eyes,  though  the  impression  it  made  in  us 
remain,  yet  other  objects  more  present  succeeding,  and 
working  on  us,  the  imagination  of  the  past  is  obscured, 
and  made  weak,  as  the  voice  of  man  is  in  the  noise  of 
the  day.  From  whence  it  followeth,  that  the  longer  the 


HOBBES:   DOGMATIC   MATERIALISM.  23 

time  is,  after  the  sight  or  sense  of  any  object,  the  weaker 
is  the  imagination.  For  the  continual  change  of  man'3 
body  destroys  in  time  the  parts  which  in  the  sense  were 
moved;  so  that  distance  of  time,  and  of  place,  hath  one 
and  the  same  effect  in  us/'C1) 

And  again  later  we  find  him  saying:  "All  fan- 
cies are  motions  within  us,  relics  of  those  made  in 
the  sense ".  Let  no  one  think  the  word  "  decay " 
significant,  it  is  clear  from  the  above  that  it  does 
not  mean  that  motion  ceases ;  but  is  merely  coun- 
teracted by  other  motions,  and  the  concomitant 
images,  merely  obscured  for  the  time  by  new 
images,  reassert  themselves  in  sleep  and  in  the 
processes  of  thought. 

A  test  of  their  strength  may  easily  be  made  by 
anyone  in  sleep,  when  images  take  on  the  vivacity 
of  phantasms  of  sense,  as  may  be  seen  from  the 
following  citation: 

"IMAGINATION  therefore  is  nothing  else  but  sense  decay- 
ing, or  weakened,  by  the  absence  of  the  object.  But  what 
may  be  the  cause  of  this  decay  or  weakening?  Is  the 
motion  the  weaker,  because  the  object  is  taken  away?  If 
it  were,  then  phantasms  would  always  and  necessarily  be 
less  clear  in  the  imagination,  than  they  are  in  sense; 
which  is  not  true.  For  in  dreams,  which  are  the  imagin- 
ations of  those  which  sleep,  they  are  no  less  clear  than  in 
sense  itself.  But  the  reason  why  in  men  waking  the 
phantasms  of  things  past  are  more  obscure  than  those  of 
things  present,  is  this,  that  their  organs  being  at  the 
same  time  moved  by  other  present  objects,  those  phan- 
tasms are  the  less  predominant.  Whereas  in  sleep,  the 
passages  being  shut  up,  external  action  does  not  at  all 
disturb  or  hinder  internal  motion."  (2) 


(*)  Leviathan,  Chapter  II,  Par.  2. 

(*)  Elements  of  Philosophy,  (M  1,  396). 


24  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

What  has  been  experienced  is  thus  successfully 
retained  as  images,  and  the  primary  function  of 
mind  is  just  this  conservation  of  experience.  To 
this  subject  we  shall  return  later  but  for  the 
present  we  shall  turn  to  another  problem. 

Hobbes  agrees  with  Des Cartes  in  his  distinction 
between  the  essential  and  non-essential  qualities 
that  constitute  an  external  object,  or  body, — or 
rather  the  objective  and  subjective  aspects  of 
bodies.  This  distinction,  years  afterwards,  be- 
came current  in  philosophical  writings  in  the 
terminology  of  Locke  as  the  primary  and 
secondary  qualities  of  bodies.  The  essential  quali- 
ties for  Hobbes  are,  of  course,  motion  and  exten- 
sion, which,  as  we  have  seen,  fits  in  well  with  his 
theory  of  sensation.  That  our  images,  then,  in 
no  wise  agree  with  their  objects,  goes  without 
saying  for  Hobbes;  the  vast  majority  of  qualities 
that  we  attribute  to  bodies  are  not  in  them  at  all. 
This  may  be  gone  at  experimentally.  Observa- 
tion teaches  us  that  images  may  arise  in  the  mind 
even  when  there  is  no  external  object  present  to 
the  senses;  in  such  cases  a  phantasm  is  beyond 
all  'doubt  subjective.  Again  there  are  instances 
in  which  two  phantasms  arise  when  only  one  ex- 
ternal object  is  present  to  the  senses;  in  such  a 
case  it  would  appear  that  either  the  one  or  the 
other  of  these  images  is  subjective, — if  one  is  un- 
real, then  why  have  we  not  reason  for  believing 
the  other  also  in  the  same  case.  Such  is  the  in- 


HOBBES:   DOGMATIC   MATERIALISM.  25 

ductive  proof  used  by  our  author  to  establish  the 
subjectivity  of  phantasms,  which  finally  is  con- 
cluded with  these  words : 

"And  from  hence  also  it  followeth,  that  whatsoever  ac- 
cidents or  qualities  our  senses  make  us  think  there  bo  In 
the  world,  they  be  not  there,  but  are  seeming  and  appar- 
itions only;  the  things  that  really  are  in  the  world  with- 
out us,  are  thoso  motions  by  which  these  seemings  are 
caused.  And  this  is  the  great  deception  of  sense,  which 
also  is  to  be  by  sense  corrected,  for  as  sense  telleth  me, 
when  I  see  directly,  that  the  colour  seemeth  to  be  in  the 
object;  so  also  sense  telleth  me,  when  I  see  by  reflection. 
that  colour  is  not  in  the  object."  (J) 

Much  might  be  made  of  the  phenomenology  of 
Hobbes,  despite  the  inductive  proof  here  offered 
for  what  he  elsewhere  treats  as  a  deduction  from 
his  universal  that  motion  causes  all  and  therefore 
phantasms.  But  the  value  of  such  an  attack  is 
open  to  question.  In  how  far  does  his  position 
differ  from  that  of  modern  science  according  to 
which  the  real  world  of  objects  apart  from  mind 
is,  theoretically  at  least,  a  dark  colourless  sea  of 
moving  atoms?  What  attitude  we  are  to  assume 
towards  Hobbes  here,  depends  in  large  measure 
upon  the  avenue  of  approach.  From  the  stand- 
point of  open-minded  experimentalism  the  situa- 
tion is  just  what  we  find  it,  and  further  investiga- 
tion is  certainly  not  precluded.  But  if  one  ap- 
proaches the  subject  with  the  philosophers,  a 
priori,  from  a  two-world  theory,  the  case  is  quite 
different.  We  then  have  the  problem  of  Cartesian 
dualism,  an  old  friend,  but  in  an  entirely  new 

(x)  Human  Nature,  Chap.  II,  last  Par. 


26  IDEAUSTIC   BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

dress;  for  it  must  be  remembered  that  images 
constitute  the  very  fabric  of  mind  for  Hobbes. 
Stated  in  his  terms,  the  problem  loses  some  of 
its  usual  mystery  and  significance.  This  has  im- 
portant bearings  upon  the  formality  of  the  prob- 
lem. The  question  for  us  now  is  a  definite  one, 
just  how  are  images  caused  by  motion?  Granting 
that  sensation  is  motion  and  that  it  is  dependent 
upon  motion,  how  do  we  know  that  sensation 
causes  images?  From  the  philosopher's  stand- 
point, Hobbes  does  not  appear  to  fully  appreciate 
the  difficulty  before  him;  the  knot  that  so  many 
philosophers  would  untie,  he,  in  the  eyes  of  many, 
merely  cuts.  He  takes  the  liberty  of  passing  freely 
from  phantasms  to  motion  and  from  motion  to 
phantasms.  Is  this  so  easy  as  our  author  would 
have  us  believe  ?  When  he  says  that  the  motion  of 
the  external  object  sets  in  motion  the  internal 
parts  of  the  body,  there  is  no  objection  to  that, 
speaking  generally ;  that  appears  to  be  good  phys- 
ics. But  what,  pray,  has  this  to  do  with  the  origin 
of  apparitions,  or  seemings,  which  are  merely  con- 
comitant with  motion?  Does  Hobbes,  then,  not 
miss  an  excellent  opportunity  to  assume  the 
Humean  position  on  causation?  As  a  philosopher, 
three  positions  besides  Cartesian  dualism  were 
open  to  him,  all  of  which  have  been  unduly 
stressed  since  his  time.  The  idealist  has  obviated 
the  difficulty  by  making  it  his  starting  point,  since 
the  subject  and  his  phantasms  constitute  the  entire 
universe.  The  parellelist  undertakes  to  define  no 


HOBBES:   DOGMATIC   MATERIALISM.  27 

relationship  between  the  two  worlds;  apparitions 
and  motions  just  are  and  happen  also  to  be  con- 
comitant. The  third  position  is  that  of  thorough- 
going materialism,  which  is  where  we  find  Hobbes ; 
for  motion  is  the  cause  of  all  things,  and  is,  there- 
fore, the  cause  of  apparition.  Approaching  the 
subject  in  an  empirical  temper,  observing  our 
phantasms  he  says : 

(They)  "are  not  always  the  same;  new  ones  appear  to 
us,  and  old  ones  vanish,  according  as  we  apply  our  organs 
of  sense  now  to  the  one  object,  now  to  another.  Where- 
fore they  are  generated  and  perish.  And  from  here  it  is 
manifest,  that  they  are  some  change  or  mutation  in  the 
sentient."  (l) 

That  is  to  say,  for  Hobbes  there  is  no  such 
problem  as  that  of  mind  and  matter.  Whether 
this  be  called  naive  realism  or  rank  materialism, 
in  this  respect  Hobbes  goes  back  to  Democritus, 
or  if  you  choose,  anticipates  the  position  taken 
by  many  thinkers  since  the  advent  of  the  evolu- 
tionary hypothesis.  For  as  the  generations  have 
passed  the  Cartesian  problem  has  gradually  lost 
its  significance.  Our  author,  however,  was  not 
unmindful  of  the  intellectualist ;  if  he  chooses  to 
ask  how  it  is  that  notice  can  be  taken  of  these 
changes  in  a  sentient  creature,  whether  it  be  by 
means  of  some  internal  sense,  we  have  Hobbes' 
reply : 

"I  answer,  by  sense  itself,  namely,  by  the  memory  which 
for  some  time  remains  in  us  of  things  sensible,  though 
they  themselves  pass  away.  For  he  that  perceives  that  he 
perceives  remembers,  sentire  se  sentisse,  meminisse  est."(*) 


(*)  Elements  of  Philosophy.  Chap.  XXV,  Par.  2. 
(3)  Elements  of  Philosophy,  Chap.  XXV,  Par.  1. 


28  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

It  now  becomes  clear  that  our  author,  by  his 
naive  position,  if  one  chooses  to  call  it  such,  has 
really  anticipated  the  modern  position  on  the  sub- 
ject. Mind  is  conservative,  it  is  the  power  of  one 
experience  to  call  up  another;  images  are  the 
means  by  which  it  is  done.  Thought,  as  Hobbes 
sees  it,  is  reflective, — that  is,  so  far  as  thought  is 
relevant  to  the  discussion.  Or  if  Hobbes  had 
stated  it  in  present-day  language,  he  might  well 
have  said :  Mind  represents  inhibited  action ;  it  is, 
then,  an  organ  of  behavior  and  is  as  much  a  part 
of  the  organism  as  the  hand,  the  leg  or  any  other 
organ  of  the  organism.  Whence,  then,  this  op- 
position of  mind  and  matter?  In  such  a  psychol- 
ogy there  is  no  place  for  this  problem,  purely 
formal  in  its  nature,  and  in  his  neglect  of  it 
Hobbes  gives  another  example  of  how  nearly 
he  approximates  the  present-day  physiological 
psychology.  It  must  not  be  supposed  either  that 
in  the  above  citation  there  is  any  disposition  to 
belittle  intelligent  inquiry  into  the  nature  of  per- 
ception. Hobbes  says :  ' 1  Of  all  phenomena,  or  ap- 
pearances which  are  near  us,  the  most  admirable 
is  apparition  itself. "  The  absence  of  the  evolu- 
tionary hypothesis  helped  to  make  the  problem 
possible  and  significant  in  those  days;  for  this 
reason  its  neglect  by  Hobbes  is  really  all  the  more 
commendable. 

We  shall  have  occasion  to  refer  to  other  re- 
spects in  which  Hobbes  is  in  alliance  with  present- 


HOBBES:    DOGMATIC    MATERIALISM.  29 

day  psychology.  But  perhaps  none  is  more  sig- 
nificant than  his  definition  of  sensation,  which  may 
not  be  out  of  place  at  this  point : 

"Sense  is  a  phantasm,  made  by  the  reaction  and  en- 
deavor outwards  in  the  organ  of  sense,  caused  by  the 
endeavor  inwards  from  the.  object,  remaining  for  some 
time  more  or  less."  (*) 

If  we  rob  this  definition  of  some  of  its  cruder 
physiological  presuppositions  as  to  the  function 
of  the  heart,  quite  irrelevant  here  and  due  to  the 
state  of  physiology  in  his  day,  we  shall  see  how 
very  similar  it  is  to  the  present-day  theories  as 
to  sense  stimuli  and  consequent  reaction  involved 
in  perception.  All  this  is  quite  interesting  in  the 
light  of  the  fact  that  Locke  has  had  the  credit  for 
doing  so  much  to  overthrow  the  doctrine  of  in- 
nate ideas  and  other  ancient  doctrines.  Much 
that  has  been  attributed  to  Locke  should  be 
credited  to  the  influence  of  Hobbes ;  certainly  his 
revolutionary  doctrine  that  there  are  no  innate 
ideas  was  set  forth  by  Hobbes  in  its  baldest  de- 
tails, as  we  have  just  seen  a  few  pages  back.  That 
Hobbes '  position  was  fully  appreciated  by  his  con- 
temporaries, can  be  easily  gathered  by  the  read- 
ing of  a  few  pages  of  the  writings  of  Ralph  Cud- 
worth.  But  there  is  more  in  Hobbes  than  this 
bald  denial  of  intuitionalism.  In  the  few  lines 
that  he  devoted  to  the  analysis  of  the  behavior  of 
mental  phenomena  he  did  some  good  constructive 


*)  Elements  of  Philosophy,  Chap.  XXV,  Par.  5. 


30  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

work.  We  must  not  allow  the  fact  that  he  was 
fighting  the  intuitionalist  and  was  therefore  lay- 
ing great  stress  upon  the  fact  that  our  ideas  are 
gained  from  experience  rather  than  inborn  to 
blind  us  to  the  importance  of  his  work  in  a  posi- 
tive direction.  But  to  properly  set  this  forth,  we 
must  turn  back  again  to  the  fundamental  nature 
of  mind. 

Attention  has  already  been  directed  to  the 
stress  Hobbes  laid  upon  the  conservative  aspect 
of  mind,  but  the  manner  in  which  mind  retains  ex- 
perience may  be  set  forth  in  greater  detail.  To 
the  simple  law  of  motion,  not  often  reflected  upon, 
according  to  our  author,  the  persistence  as  well 
as  the  origin  of  all  the  images,  or  fancies,  that  flit 
across  the  mind,  is  due  and  to  that  alone.  This  is 
in  a  nut-shell  the  how  of  retention,  and  it  is  just 
these  "relics"  of  sensuous  experience  that  con- 
stitute the  very  fabric  of  mind.  Nor  has  mind  any 
original  power  whereby  it  can  introduce  other 
images  than  those  that  it  has  thus  acquired.  Long 
before  the  sober  Locke  had  declared  that  the  mind 
can  frame  unto  itself  no  new  simple  ideas,  Hobbes 
had  set  forth  in  a  manner  not  so  foreign  in  spirit 
to  modern  physiological-psychology,  the  origin  of 
all  our  ideas,  images,  fancies,  or  whatever  one 
wishes  to  call  them.  His  ignorance  of  the  nature 
of  neural  connections  does  not  invalidate  the  value 
of  his  description.  All  the  images  in  our  mind 
are  due  to  sensation,  motions  in  the  internal  parts 


HOBBESl   DOGMATIC   MATEBIALISM.  31 

of  the  sentient  creature,  and  they  persist  in  ac- 
cordance with,  or  in  obedience  to,  the  fundamental 
laws  of  motion,  the  motion  of  the  internal  parts 
continuing  after  the  removal  of  the  stimulus,  just 
as  the  "  waves  of  the  storm-tossed  sea  cannot  give 
over  their  motion'7  although  the  storm  has  sub- 
sided. Since  this  motion  of  the  internal  parts  can 
never  completely  cease,  the  image  that  is  con- 
comitant with  it,  or  that  is  caused  by  it,  as  Hobbes 
puts  it,  can  never  really  disappear  from  the  mind. 
It  may  become  obscured  by  the  thousands  of  other 
impressions  that  are  constantly  pouring  in  upon 
the  mind  through  the  gateway  of  sensation,  and 
therefore  become  less  and  less  vivid  as  time 
elapses, — but  completely  disappear  they  cannot. 
Ideas  pass  out  of  consciousness  for  the  simple 
reason  that  other  ideas  come  in  to  crowd  them 
out,  taking  their  places,  different  motions  coun- 
teracting each  other  in  the  internal  parts.  But 
this  does  not  mean  that  these  ideas,  although  they 
have  been  forced  to  retire,  have,  therefore,  been 
obliterated  from  the  mind.  For  it  is  just  these 
images,  ideas,  or  fancies,  relics  of  experience,  that 
constitute  the  mind;  since  this  is  so,  to  obliterate 
them  would  be  to  destroy  mind.  Thought  is  the 
powor  to  control  images;  hence  for  Hobbes  the 
thinking  process  presupposes  sensation. 

An  excellent  opportunity  for  the  study  of  the 
imagination  (mental  imagery,  as  we  would  say 
now-a-days)  is  offered  in  dreams.  Here  we  have 


32  IDEALISTIC  BEGINNINGS  IN  ENGLAND. 

relics  of  past  experiences  active  in  their  greatest 
vividness.  For  the  organs  of  sense  are  numbed 
in  sleep  and  all  access  to  the  world  without  is 
shut  off;  and  the  mind,  for  this  reason,  is  not 
open  to  the  onset  of  new  impressions  that  in 
waking  moments  so  quickly  force  into  retirement 
other  images.  So  vivid  are  these  images  and 
fancies  of  sleep  that  there  is  nothing  to  be  com- 
pared with  them  but  the  phantasms  of  sense.  It 
is,  therefore,  for  our  author  anything  but  sur- 
prising that  some  people  sometimes  confuse  the 
images  and  phantasms  of  actual  perception  in 
waking  life  with  those  of  dream  life.  Thus  Bru- 
tus, dreaming  in  his  tent  on  the  field  of  battle, 
sees  the  form  of  great  Caesar  standing  before  him 
with  words  of  warning  on  his  lips  with  such  vivid- 
ness that  on  waking  he  would  have  it  that  the 
spirit  of  dead  Caesar  had  appeared  to  him,  being 
astonished  that  his  servant  neither  heard  nor  saw 
him.  Indeed  the  waking  life  and  dream  life  are 
not  so  different  as  we  would  have  it  generally; 
the  two  experiences  possess  such  similarities  that 
it  is  really  difficult  to  set  forth  an  accurate  dis- 
tinction. If  such  can  be  made,  it  lies  in  the  fact 
that  our  waking  life  experiences  are  more  inclu- 
sive than  our  dream  life  experiences.  He  con- 
tinues : 

"and  because  waking  I  often  observe  the  absurdity  of 
dreams,  but  never  dream  of  the  absurdities  of  my  waking 
thoughts;  I  am  well  satisfied,  that  being  awake,  I  know  I 
dream  not,  though  when  I  dream,  I  think  myself  awake."  (x) 


C1)  Leviathan.  Chap.  II. 


HOBBES:   DOGMATIC   MATERIALISM.  33 

It  is  interesting  to  note,  too,  in  this  connection 
that  our  author  anticipated  the  work  of  Spencer 
when  he  gives  it  as  his  opinion  that  from 

"ignorance  of  how  to  distinguish  dreams,  and  other  strong 
fancies,  from  visions  and  sense,  did  arise  the  greatest  part 
of  the  religion  of  the  gentiles  in  times  past,  that  wor- 
shipped satyrs,  fawns,  nymphs,  and  the  like;  and  now-a- 
days  the  opinions  that  rude  people  have  of  fairies,  ghosts, 
and  goblins,  and  of  the  power  of  witches. "C1) 

All  of  which  would  never  have  been  the  case,  such 
is  our  author's  firm  conviction,  had  savage  peoples 
been  acquainted  with  the  workings  of  the  human 
mind.  So,  too,  the  ignorance  of  the  play  of  mental 
imagery  accounts  for  the  superstition  of  rude  peo- 
ple. And  in  this  connection  Hobbes  finds  occasion 
for  offence.  How  much  better,  he  would  know, 
is  the  scholastic  doctrine  of  volition?  In  teaching 
that  images  and  ideas  arise  in  the  mind  at  the 
beck  and  call  of  the  will  of  the  individual,  are  not 
schoolmen  fostering  just  such  superstition?  Those 
who  so  teach  are  both  deceived  and  deceiving; 
mental  images  are  not  the  effect  of  our  will,  but 
our  will  is  rather  the  effect  of  our  mental  images. 
But  we  cannot  here  take  up  volition,  the  treat- 
ment of  which  will  be  given  in  greater  detail  later. 
From  what  has  been  said  up  to  this  point,  it 
now  becomes  quite  clear  that  the  imagination  is 
a  very  fundamental  term,  for  Hobbes.  It  is,  in 
fact,  another  word  for  mind,  a  term  that  carries 
well  that  emphasis  that  Hobbes  has  seen  fit  to 


J)  Leviathan.  Chap.  II. 


34  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

place  upon  the  conservative  aspect  of  mind.  For 
mind  is  not  for  him  an  original  power,  but  on  the 
contrary,  the  conservation  of  sensuous  experience. 
Now,  the  term  imagination  is  used  to  cover  all 
these  mental  images  and  processes  of  thought. 
For,  in  his  own  words, 

"besides  sense,  and  thoughts,  and  trains  of  thoughts,  the 
mind  of  man  has  no  other  motion;  though  by  the  help 
of  speech  and  method  the  same  faculties  may  be  improved 
to  such  a  height,  as  to  distinguish  men  from  all  other 
living  creatures."  (*) 

Man's  difference  from  all  other  animals  consists 
merely  in  his  better  use  of  the  imagination.  He 
has,  to  be  definite,  no  other  faculties  or  powers, 
or  divinely  implanted  gifts.  Such  as  are  so  called 
and  commonly  supposed  to  be  are  but  other  names 
for  the  imagination,  when  regarded  now  from  this 
and  now  from  that  aspect.  Nothing  in  the  whole 
of  Hobbes'  writings  is  clearer  than  this  attitude 
of  his  towards  mental  imagery.  Memory  thus 
is  another  name  for  imagination,  that  emphasizes 
the  fact  that  the  experience  under  consideration 
belongs  to  past  time,  or  in  the  words  of  present- 
day  psychology,  the  images  of  memory  are  local- 
ized in  time  and  place,  while  those  of  the  imagina- 
tion are  "set  free."  Thus  it  is  clear: 

"This  decaying  sense,  when  we  would  express  the  thing 
itself,  I  mean  fancy  itself,  we  call  imagination,  as  I  said 
before:  but  when  we  would  express  decay,  signify  that  the 
sense  is  fading,  old  and  past,  it  is  called  memory.  So  that 


(*)  Leviathan,  Chap.  III. 


HOBBES:    DOGMATIC   MATERIALISM.  35 

imagination   and  memory  are  but  one  thing,  which   for 
diverse  considerations  hath  diverse  names."  C1) 

Likewise  the  understanding  is  another  name 
for  imagination,  or  an  operation  of  the  imagina- 
tion; for  to  understand  a  thing  is  to  call  up  an 
image  of  the  thing  named,  or  the  images  that  cor- 
respond to  the  sign  given,  the  association  of  an 
image  of  sound  with  one  of  sight,  say.  If  when 
the  word  cow  is  spoken  in  the  presence  of  a  child, 
the  visual  image  of  a  cow  arises  in  the  mind  of 
the  child,  then  it  may  be  said  that  the  child  under- 
stands, the  two  images  of  cow  being  associated 
in  the  mind  of  the  child,  it  understands  the  sign 
given.  But  the  child  being  unable  to  call  up  the 
image  of  a  horse  when  the  word  hippos  is  spoken, 
is  said  not  to  understand,  the  sign  given  not 
calling  up  the  visual  image  that  should  corres- 
pond. These  two  images  not  being  associated  in 
the  child's  sensuous  experience,  it  has  no  under- 
standing on  that  point. 

Beasts,  then,  no  less  than  men,  have  understand- 
ings; for  they  have  images  to  correspond  to  the 
signs  given  them,  as  is  most  frequently  illustrated 
when  they  do  our  bidding.  When,  then,  the  im- 
agination is  active  in  response  to  given  signs, 
visual  and  auditory  and  other  images  being  prop- 
erly associated,  we  may  call  this  understanding. 

So  likewise,  it  is  with  all  other  mental  processes ; 
they  are  but  mere  names  for  one  and  the  same 


Leviathan,  Chap.  II. 


36  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS   IN    ENGLAND. 

thing,  the  imagination,  but  this  can  best  be  set 
fourth  in  our  author's  own  words: 

"To  consider  a  thing  is  to  imagine  it;  to  understand 
a  thing  is  to  imagine  it;  to  hope  and  fear,  is  to  imagine 
the  things  hoped  for  and  feared.  The  difference  is,  that 
when  we  imagine  the  consequence  of  anything,  we  are 
said  to  consider  that  thing;  and  when  we  imagine  from  a 
sign,  and  especially  from  those  signs  we  call  names,  we 
are  said  to  understand  his  meaning  that  maketh  the  sign, 
and  when  we  reason,  we  imagine  the  consequences  of 
affirmations  and  negations  joined  together;  when  we 
hope  or  fear,  we  imagine  things  good  or  hurtful  to  our- 
selves; in-so-much  as  all  these  are  but  imaginations  di- 
versely named  from  different  circumstances;  as  any  man 
may  perceive  as  easily  as  he  can  look  into  his  thoughts."  (*) 

If  we  are  to  take  seriously  what  our  author  has 
set  forth  up  to  this  point,  certain  conclusions  are 
inevitable.  All  our  faculties  are  of  one  funda- 
mental nature,  different  names  for  ways  in  which 
images  behave.  In  so  far  as  setting  one  faculty 
over  against  another,  after  the  manner  of  Kant, 
this  is  out  of  the  question;  for  there  is  no  suffi- 
cient reason  for  it,  there  being  no  difference  in 
them.  They  are  all  the  same  fundamental  thing, 
which  when  it  acts  so,  we  call  by  such  and  such 
name ;  and  when  it  acts  differently,  we  call  by  an- 
other name.  Regarded  in  this  light  of  mere 
names  for  the  behavior  of  images,  there  could  be 
little  harm  in  a  faculty  psychology;  but  if  tone 
comes  to  think  too  seriously  of  these  separate 
faculties  of  mind,  it  would  according  to  Hobbes' 
view,  be  very  misleading  to  speak  of  the  different 
faculties  of  mind.  Far  better  always  to  bear  in 


I1)  Questions  Concerning  Human  Liberty  (M.  V.  358-359). 


Xv-11 

I 

1    UN/V£ftaiT 

HOBBES:   DOGMATIC   MATERIALISM.  37 

mind  the  fact  that  these  are  fundamentally  one 
and  the  same  thing,  are  of  one  and  the  same  na- 
ture. To  do  this  in  a  thorough-going  way  will,  he 
feels,  be  to  relieve  us  of  the  foolishness  of  the 
schoolmen,  who  believe  that  this  or  that  faculty 
has  power  over  the  images  in  the  mind.  And  it 
may  also  be  had  in  mind  that  it  might  have  saved 
us  from  Kant's  compartmental  aspect  of  mind. 

The  consequences  implicit  in  the  position  of 
Hobbes  are  far  reaching.  The  human  mind,  so 
viewed,  is  an  integral  part  of  the  universe;  the 
motions  that  disturb  it,  which  cause  our  ideas,  are 
the  same  motions  that  constitute  the  universe  as 
a  whole.  Our  individual  minds  are  part  and 
parcel  of  the  universe  and  possess  just  as  little 
liberty  as  this  figure  allows.  Would  it  help  to 
replace  the  term  motion  here  with  the  term  mind? 
This  is  what  Berkeley,  with  some  changes  of  con-  - 
ception,  (to  say  nothing  of  Edwards  and  other 
good  theologians)  really  did.  Berkeley,  how- 
ever, keeps  the  power  of  forming  ideas  in  the 
mind  in  the  individual,  while  sensations  are  caused 
by  universal  mind ;  but  it  is  the  content  of  the  term 
will  that  enables  him  to  make  the  separation  be- 
tween the  two  realms.  If  will  is  to  be  regarded 
as  a  fundamental  term  in  the  study  of  mind, 
Berkeley's  psychological  interpretation  of  the  uni- 
verse is  much  to  the  point. 

But  the  conception  of  Hobbes  is  quite  thorough- 
going. The  term  motion,  which  he  had  used  to 
explain  both  mind  and  matter,  does  not  allow  of 


38  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

this  separation  as  does  the  term  will,  so  far  as 
terms  go.  Let  us,  then,  follow  up  a  little  further 
the  implied  consequences  of  his  position.  We  as 
individuals  cannot  think,  imagine,  or  reason  be- 
cause we  desire  to  or  will  to,  but  quite  to  the  con- 
trary, we  perform  these  acts  of  mind  simply  be- 
cause we  are  a  part  of  the  universe,,  which  is  in 
motion,  of  which  the  essence  is  motion,  which  is 
likewise  the  essence  of  mind.  Our  imagination 
is  active,  our  thoughts  play,  just  in  the  same  way 
and  for  the  same  reason  that  the  sun  moves,  the 
stars  move,  and  the  waves  of  the  sea  lash  in  their 
fury.  Our  minds  are  not  substances  distinct  from 
extension,  endowed  with  original  power,  as  with 
DesCartes  and  Locke.  We  are,  on  the  contrary, 
of  one  essence  with  the  universe  of  extension,  sub- 
ject to  the  laws  of  motion,  its  essence.  Particular 
attention  is  drawn  to  these  logical  consequences 
implicit  in  the  position  of  Hobbes  for  reasons  that 
will  appear  later. 

Images  that  arise  in  the  mind  are  of  two  dis- 
tinct kinds;  simple,  "as  when  one  imagineth  a 
a  man,  or  a  horse,  which  he  hath  seen  before,  and 
compounded,  as  when  from  the  sight  of  a  man 
seen  at  one  time,  and  of  a  horse  seen  at  another, 
we  conceive  in  our  mind  a  centaur."  It  will  be 
noticed  that  what  Hobbes  here  calls  compounded 
imagination  is  what  is  generally  referred  to  as 
the  imagination,  or  more  exactly,  as  the  creative 
imagination.  Popularly,  this  compounding  of 


HOBBES:  DOGMATIC  MATERIALISM.  39 

images,  or  better,  these  creations  of  the  imagina- 
tion, are  thought  of  as  the  work  of  the  will;  this 
conception  is,  as  set  forth  above,  absolutely 
foreign  to  the  conception  of  mind  entertained  by 
Hobbes.  That  images  are  not  under  the  control 
of  the  will  may  easily  be  discovered  by  a  little 
observation  of  the  working  of  our  own  minds, 
according  to  our  author.  This  doctrine  of  the 
power  of  the  will  along  with  those  kindred  doc- 
trines that  our  good  thoughts  are  due  to  God 
while  our  evil  thoughts  are  due  to  the  devil,  to 
say  nothing  of  the  elaborate  system  where  it 
is  taught  that 

"the  senses  receive  the  species  of  things  and  deliver  them 
to  the  common  sense,  which  in  turn  delivers  them  to  the 
fancy,  which  again  delivers  them  to  the  memory,  whence 
they  are  handed  over  to  the  judgment"  etc.  (*) 

are  all  in  one  bundle  classed  as  the  foolishness  of 
the  deceived  and  deceiving  schoolmen,  who  with 
their  many  words  still  make  nothing  understood. 
None  of  these  doctrines  have  any  foundation; 
least  of  all  is  it  true  that  the  will  controls  the 
play  of  mental  images.  Quite  the  contrary : 

"Sense,  memory,  understanding,  reason,  and  opinion  are 
not  in  our  power  to  change;  but  always,  and  necessarily 
such  as  the  things  we  see,  hear,  and  consider,  suggest  them 
to  us;  and  therefore  are  not  effects  of  our  will,  but  our 
will  of  them."(2) 


(*)  Leviathan,  Chap.  II. 

(')  Leviathan,  (M.  Ill,  360). 


4:0  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN  ENGLAND. 

How  nearly  Hobbes'  conception  of  will  ap- 
proaches that  offered  to-day  may  be  seen  from 
the  following  citation : 

"In  deliberation,  the  last  appetite,  or  aversion,  immedi- 
ately adhering  to  the  action,  or  to  the  omission  thereof, 
is  that  we  call  the  WILL;  the  act,  not  the  faculty,  of  willing. 
And  beasts  that  have  deliberation,  must  necessarily  also 
have  will.  The  definition  of  the  will,  given  commonly 
by  the  Schools,  that  it  is  a  rational  appetite,  is  not  good. 
For  if  it  were,  then  could  there  be  no  voluntary  act  against 
reason.  For  a  voluntary  act,  is  that,  which  proceedeth 
from  the  will,  and  no  other.  But  if  instead  of  a  rational 
appetite,  we  shall  say  an  appetite  resulting  from  a  pre- 
cedent deliberation,  then  the  deliberation  is  the  same  that 
I  have  given  here.  Will,  therefore,  is  the  last  appetite  in 
deliberating"^) 

"As  in  the  water,  that  hath  not  only  liberty,  but  a  neces- 
sity of  descending  by  the  channel;  so  likewise  in  the 
actions  which  men  voluntarily  do;  which,  because  they 
proceed  from  their  will,  proceed  from  liberty;  and  yet 
because  every  act  of  man's  will,  and  every  desire,  and 
inclination  proceedeth  from  some  cause,  and  that  from 
another  cause,  in  a  continual  change,  whose  first  link 
is  in  the  hand  of  God,  the  first  of  all  causes,  proceed 
from  necessity,  so  that  to  him  that  could  see  the  connec- 
tion of  those  causes,  the  necessity  of  all  men's  voluntary 
actions,  would  appear  manifest."  (') 

The  foregoing  citation,  I  think,  sets  forth  cor- 
rectly Hobbes*  conception  of  will.  While  there* 
are  other  passages  of  a  more  or  less  popular 
nature  that  might  be  construed  otherwise,  these, 
his  definite  statements,  should  be  taken  as  the 
test  of  his  doctrine.  The  meaning  of  it  is  this: 
Hobbes  does  not  regard  the  concept  will  as 
fundamental  and  ultimate — hence  it  is  not  fruit- 
ful to  use  such  a  term  in  the  analysis  of  mind. 


(•)  Leviathan,  Chap.  VI. 
(')  Leviathan,  (M.  Ill,  196). 


HOBBES:   DOGMATIC   MATERIALISM.  41 

The  term  is  popular  and  anthropomorphic.  Here 
he  is  opposed  to  Berkeley,  for  whom  the  term 
will  is  fundamental  and  original.  Hobbes  does, 
however,  take  carefully  into  consideration  the 
same  phenomena  that  Berkeley  treats  under  the 
term  will.  The  treatment  of  Hobbes  is  of  a  thor- 
oughly scientific  nature.  Man's  use  of  arbitrary 
signs  by  which  he  controls  his  impulses  and  gets 
the  better  of  nature  and  environment  is  more  than 
once  alluded  to  in  the  works  of  Hobbes.  We 
shall  have  occasion  to  refer  to  this  subject,  how- 
ever, under  another  head  where  it  will  be  taken 
up  in  greater  detail. 

But  the  above  doctrines,  especially  those  with 
reference  to  the  will,  do  not  mean  that  these  com- 
pounded images  do  not,  to  all  intents  and  pur- 
poses, constitute  real  creations.  This  is  just  what 
images  are,  and  causal  explanation  does  not  make 
them  any  the  less  so.  Mind,  indeed,  is  quite*  given 
to  this  habit  of  compounding  images,  and  it  is  this 
with  the  use  of  signs  that  has  helped  to  make  the 
difference  between  man  and  his  brothers  in  na- 
ture. It  is  from  this  source  that  all  man's  lofty 
constructions  flow.  And  it  is  his  perpetuation  of 
this  habit  that  enabled  him  to  cope  all  the  more 
successfully  with  natural  obstacles.  Out  of  this 
power,  or  habit,  comes  philosophy,  which  if  cul- 
tivated, will  according  to  the  teachings  of  Hobbes, 
do  so  much  for  mankind. 

But  unfortunately  there  is  another  side  to  this 
habit  of  compounding  images ;  for  what  gives,  un- 


42  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN    ENGLAND. 

der  the  significant  name  of  the  creative  imagina- 
tion (as  it  is  now  called),  such  lofty  conceptions 
and  what  is  of  so  much  service  to  man  in  art,  in 
inventions  and  all  his  many  endeavors,  also  gives 
us  results  that  are  as  pernicious  as  these  are  ser- 
viceable :  like  all  powers  in  the  universe,  it  works 
for  good  and  bad  alike.  Many  people  with  lively 
and  uncontrolled  mental  activity  have  com- 
pounded, for  instance,  the  images  of  their  own 
person  with  that  of  other  persons,  distinguished 
persons,  it  may  be,  of  times  past.  Especially  is 
this  true  of  those  young  persons  who  are  given 
to  the  reading  of  romances.  To  this  also  may  be 
added  the  many  cases  that  arise  from  time  to  time 
of  persons  claiming  to  be  this  or  that  great  man, 
announcing  themselves  as  prophets  risen  from 
the  dead,  or  claiming  themselves  to  be  saviours  of 
men,  seers,  and  workers  of  miracles.  All  of  which, 
according  to  Hobbes,  is  due  to  this  compounding 
habit  of  mind,  or  the  creative  imagination.  And 
it  may  be  said  that  no  theory  of  mind  fits  in  so 
well  in  the  explanation  of  insanity  as  that  of 
Hobbes;  this  certainly  is  not  without  its  signifi- 
cance. 

But  if  it  be  so  that  our  minds,  as  has  been  set 
forth  above,  are  made  up  of  a  restless  sea  of  images 
in  constant  motion  and  that,  as  has  just  been  set 
forth,  these  images  are  subject  to  new  combina- 
tions not  found  in  sense,  how  is  it  that  our 
thoughts  are  what  they  are?  For  this  there  is 


HOBBES:  DOGMATIC  MATERIALISM.  43 

ample  explanation.     In  this  connection  I  cannot 
do  better  than  cite  the  immortal  passage : 

"When  a  man  thinketh  on  anything  whatsoever,  his  next 
thought  after  is  not  altogether  so  casual  as  it  seems  to  be. 
Not  every  thought  to  every  thought  succeeds  indifferently. 
But  as  we  have  no  imagination,  whereof  we  have  not  for- 
merly had  sense,  in  whole,  or  in  part;  so  we  have  no 
transition  from  one  thought  to  another  (save  as  in  sense) 
•  *  *  A  man  may  oftentimes  perceive  the  way  of  it, 
and  the  dependence  of  one  thought  upon  another.  For 
in  a  discourse  of  our  present  civil  war,  what  could  seem 
more  impertinent,  than  to  ask,  as  one  did,  what  was  the 
value  of  a  Roman  penny?  Yet  the  coherence  to  me  was 
manifest  enough.  For  the  thought  of  war,  introduced  the 
thought  of  delivering  up  the  king  to  his  enemies;  the 
thought  of  that,  brought  in  the  thought  of  the  delivering 
up  of  Christ;  and  that  again  the  thought  of  thirty  pence, 
which  was  the  price  of  that  treason;  and  thence  easily 
that  malicious  question,  and  all  this  in  a  moment  of  time; 
for  thought  is  quick."  (J) 

Thus  the  word  war  calls  up  not  only  war  images, 
but  also  other  images  that  have  been  experienced 
with  this,  which  in  turn  leads  to  still  others  which, 
if  expressed  to  the  unobservant  listener,  might 
appear  altogether  remote  from  the  subject  under 
discussion.  Thus  the  richness  of  our  sensuous 
experience  renders  possible  an  untold  number  of 
trains  of  thought.  Apparently,  then,  there  can 
be  no  certainty  as  to  what  train  of  thought  will 
follow  upon  the  mention  of  any  one  thing,  since 
the  image  of  this  one  thing  may  have  been  fol- 
lowed in  our  sensuous  experience  by  many  and 
different  images.  Why,  then,  should  one  train  of 
thought  not  flow  from  a  given  sign  as  well  as  an- 


C1)  Leviathan,  Chap.  III. 


44  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

other?  Here  comes  in  what  is  known  as  the  law 
of  association  of  ideas,  according  to  contiguity  in 
time  and  space,  for  which  our  author  goes  back 
to  Aristotle.  If  at  any  time  when  our  thoughts 
are  said  to  be  wandering  and  our  mind  is  said  to 
be  passive,  images  and  fancies  arising  as  it  were 
at  random,  we  investigate'  the  trains  of  thoughts 
that  are  then  flowing  in  our  mind,  it  will  be  found 
that  they  are  really  succeeding  each  other  in  ac- 
cordance with  these  laws  of  association  and  that 
of  motion.  At  such  a  time,  our  minds  are  accur- 
ately repeating  sense  impressions ;  but  such  times 
are  rather  rare,  since  the  mind  is  usually  under 
the  influence  of  some  emotion.  When  such  is  the 
case,  our  thoughts  are  said  to  be  unregulated. 

Our  thoughts  are,  however,  for  the  most  part 
regulated.  This  is  in  accordance  with  the  law  of 
interest  that  Hobbes  so  definitely  stated  without 
the  name  here  given  it.  Such  is  the  case  when 
our  mental  discourse  is  governed  by  some  pas- 
sionate thought,  from  which  our  minds  are  rarely 
free.  Thus,  for  example,  when  one  has  constantly 
in  mind  some  desire'd  end,  and  thinks  constantly 
either  on  the  means  that  lead  to  that  desired  end 
or  on  the  consequences  that  flow  from  the  end 
once  attained.  There  are,  then,  two  ways  where- 
by one  may  regulate  his  thoughts :  that  of  think- 
ing of  the  means  that  lead  to  the  end  desired  and 
secondly,  that  of  thinking  of  the  results  that  flow 
from  the  end  attained.  The  first  power  man  has 


HOBBES:  DOGMATIC  MATERIALISM.  45 

in  common  with  the  beasts  of  the  field,  but  the 
second  power  is  characteristic  of  man  alone. 

This  analysis  of  the  thinking  process  is  simple 
and  free  from  any  unnecessary  subtleties.  It 
shows  again  that  reflective  thought  is  the  only 
thought  that  Hobbes  regarded  as  relative  to  the 
business  he  has  in  hand.  This  is  in  keeping  with 
his  neglect  of  the  Cartesian  problem  of  mind  and 
matter.  This  shows,  too,  in  a  most  substantial 
way  his  alliance  with  present-day  tendencies  in 
philosophy.  As  parallel  with  the  above  simple 
statement  the  words  of  a  modern  thinker,1  who 
espousing  the  evolutionary  hypothesis,  has  made 
it  felt  in  the  study  of  mind,  may  be  read  with 
profit. 

This  explanation  of  thought  in  terms  of  purpose, 
so  closely  in  harmony  with  present-day  doctrines 
may  at  first  seem  to  be  out  of  harmony  with  his 
own  statement  that  thought  is  the  computation  of 
verbal  signs.  But  it  must  be  remembered  that 
this  statement  constitutes  only  an  external  ex- 
planation of  thought  and  one  that  grows  out  of 
his  emphasis  upon  verbal  signs  as  marks  for 
remembrance  in  our  own  thinking.  And  here 
Hobbes  was  hitting  at  a  most  important  truth 
which  certainly  marks  him  as  a  keen  observer.  I 
have  yet  to  see  a  just  appreciation  of  Hobbes  on 
this  point:  indeed,  not  a  few  have  wondered  just 
why  Hobbes  saw  fit  to  lay  such  stress  upon  ar- 


Studies  in  Logical  Theory,  pages  4,  10-,  14,  etc. 


46  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

bitrary  signs.  The  importance  of  this  observation 
is  made  manifest  in  the  statement  of  present-day 
psychologists.  We  think  in  terms  of  verbal  signs ; 
for  signs  are  words,  and  words  are  made  by  the 
movements  of  the  muscles,  which  gives  the  mind 
images  known  as  kinsesthetic,  which  doubtless 
form  the  vast  majority  of  our  images  and  in  terms 
of  which  we  do  most  surely  think.  Arbitrary 
signs,  then,  play  their  parts  in  two  ways :  as 
kinaesthetic  images  they  enable  us  to  control  our 
thoughts  as  well  as  to  systematize  our  experience 
in  words. 

We  have  seen  that  Hobbes  laid  great  stress 
upon  the  principle  of  association  and  that  his 
analysis  of  thought  does  not  differ  so  much  from 
that  offered  to-day  by  those  writers  who  have 
undertaken  to  apply  the  evolutionary  conception 
to  our  thoughts.  In  consideration  of  this  fact, 
it  may  seem  strange  that  Hobbes  has  received 
so  little  attention  in  the  field  of  psychology.  No 
doubt  he  has  gone  so  long  without  credit  for  the 
simple  reason  that  his  contributions  had  already 
been  assimilated  by  others.  His  influence  upon 
John  Locke  can  hardly  be  questioned;  it  was 
greater  even  than  Locke  knew.  That  his  doc- 
trines were  well  known  among  thinking  men,  is 
apparent  from  the  writings  of  Cudworth.  Locke, 
however,  did  not  take  the  completely  Hobbistic 
viewpoint.  Had  he  done  this,  he  would  not  have 
started  thought  on  its  reactionary  tendency; 
which  we  shall  soon  see  he  did.  What  he  really 


HOBBES:  DOGMATIC  MATERIALISM.  47 

did  do,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  was  to  com- 
promise the  positions  of  the  intuitionalists  and 
sensationalists.  Thus,  while  in  some  respects  he 
was  propounding  the  doctrines  of  Hobbes,  he  was 
none  the  less  reasserting  the  doctrines  of  Cud- 
worth. 

To  revert  to  Hobbes,  it  must  be  asked:  Is  his 
psychology  out  of  harmony  with  his  metaphysics? 
Or,  more  definitely,  is  not  his  law  of  interest  in- 
consistent with  his  general  position  as  to  the 
nature  of  mind  and  its  place  in  the  universe  of 
motion!  It  was  found  that,  according  to  Hobbes' 
metaphysics  of  motion,  the  mind  is  really  an  in- 
tegral part  of  the  universe  of  motion  and  of  the 
same  essence  with  it;  that  its  very  constitution 
of  mental  images  caused  by  motion  places  it  under 
the  complete  sway  of  universal  motion.  Con- 
sistently, then,  the  mind  has  no  control  over  its 
images,  but  on  the  contrary  mind  is  merely  the 
playground  of  such  images  as  are  caused  in  it  by 
the  motion  of  the  universe.  Now,  we  are  told, 
in  the  law  of  interest,  which  Hobbes  so  definitely 
stated,  that  the  mind  can  regulate  and  control 
the  play  of  its  images  either  by  seeking  the  means 
that  lead  to  some  desired  end  or  by  imagining 
the  consequences  that  flow  from  the  end  attained. 
Is  this  not  giving  the  mind  control  over  its  trains 
of  thought?  Manifestly.  Is  it  not,  then,  incon- 
sistent in  our  philosopher  to  thus  cut  his  mind 
off  from  the  universe  of  which  it  is  a  homogeneous 
part?  And  again,  the  use  of  arbitrary  signs,  of 


48  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

which  he  makes  so  much,  only  adds  to  the  separa- 
tion of  the  part  from  the  whole.  But  if  we  are 
to  take  the  position  of  present-day  teachers, 
Hobbes  is  wise  in  allowing  his  experience  of  the 
parts  to  outweigh  his  theory  of  an  unexperienced 
whole.  He  does  not  undertake  to  solve  the  in- 
soluble riddle  of  the  relation  of  the  part  to  the 
whole.  In  his  position  here  he  has  taken  a  stand 
similar  to  that  of  his  neglect  of  the  Cartesian 
problem.  He  shows,  too,  his  alliance  with  Bacon. 
Such  so-called  metaphysical  problems  are  purely 
theoretical,  and  while  they  have  undoubtedly  their 
own  value  in  their  own  way,  which  Hobbes  as  a 
theorist  would  not  controvert,  they  must  not  be 
confused  with  problems  of  a  practical  nature. 
Problems  of  psychology  are  practical,  and  they 
are  subject  to  those  checks  that  the  problems  of 
any  science  are  subject  to.  While  Hobbes  could 
hardly  be  called  an  experimental  psychologist,  in 
taking  this  fact  for  granted,  he  took  the  step  that 
rendered  the  appearance  of  experimental  psy- 
chology possible. 

Indeed,  throughout  the  whole  of  Hobbes  one 
thing  is  quite  noticeable :  stress  is  rarely  laid  upon 
theoretical  difficulties ;  unbounding  confidence  is 
always  displayed;  for 

"nothing  is  produced  by  reasoning  aright,    but    general, 
eternal  and  immutable  truth."  C1) 


Leviathan    (M.  Ill,  664). 


HOBBES:   DOGMATIC  MATEKIALJSM.  49 

It  is,  therefore,  justly  said  that  while  Hobbes  is 
correctly  regardel  as  the  founder  of  both  asso- 
ciational  and  physiological  psychology  he  was 
nevertheless  a  thorough-going  rationalist  in 
method.  But  this  is  bound  up  with  his  theory 
that  philosophy  must  always  be  of  a  practical 
nature  so  far  as  results  looked  to  are  concerned. 
This  emphasis  upon  the  practical  saved  Hobbes 
from  emphasis  upon  the  separateness  of  our  dif- 
ferent sensations,  the  atomistic  character  of  our 
experience,  and  naturally  from  the  need  of  a  unit- 
ing mind  to  systematize  them  by  means  of  innate 
forms  or  natural  faculties.  The  mind  simply  regis- 
ters and  retains  our  experience;  and  in  terms  of 
our  past  experience  the  future  may  be  predicted 
and  controlled. 


n. 

i 

LOCKE:   OPEN-MINDED   DUALISM. 


n. 

LOCKE:     OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM. 

At  the  close  of  our  study  of  Hobbes  attention 
was  called  to  the  dogmatic  character  of  his  meth- 
od. This  dogmatism  was  not  peculiar  to  Hobbes ; 
he  was  answered  in  the  same  kind  by  the  even 
more  dogmatic  intuitionalist,  Ralph  Cudworth. 
It  was  out  of  the  futility  of  dogmatic  assertions 
that  the  critical  philosophy  of  Locke  sprang.  For 
Locke  anticipated  Kant  in  his  critical  examina- 
tion of  the  human  understanding  with  a  view  to 
setting  forth  its  limitations.  This  is  a  fact  be- 
yond controversy.  The  manner  in  which  Locke 
went  at  his  examination  is  quite  different  from 
that  of  Kant;  which  gives  Kant  the  opportunity 
of  praising  what  he  is  pleased  to  term  Locke's 
natural  history  of  the  human  understanding.  In 
consequence  of  his  careful  investigation  Locke  is 
generally  spoken  of  as  the  founder  of  empirical 
psychology.  He  approaches  the  subject  from  the 
view-point  of  common  sense,  and  proceeds,  under 
the  influence  of  Hobbes  and  DesCartes,  as  nearly 
as  possible  in  harmony  with  the  scientific  knowl- 
edge of  his  time.  He  had  a  more  or  less  well- 
defined  critical  theory  to  offer  which  may  have  in- 
fluenced to  some  extent  his  work;  when  he  had 
delivered  himself  of  this,  he  supposed  that  it  might 
then 


54  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

"be  of  use  to  prevail  with  the  busy  mind  of  man  to  be 
more  cautious  in  meddling  with  things  exceeding  its  com- 
prehension; to  stop  when  it  is  at  the  utmost  extent  of  its 
tether;  to  sit  down  in  quiet  ignorance  of  those  things 
which,  upon  examination,  are  found  to  be  beyond  the  reach 
of  our  capacities."  C1) 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  Locke's  prime  interest 
is  in  knowledge  and  its  necessary  and  inevitable 
limitations,  as  he  saw  them.  As  knowledge  for 
him  is  of  ideas  and  their  compounds,  the  work  has 
much  to  do  with  psychology  and  has  the  value  of 
showing  the  importance  of  such  a  science  in 
theories  of  knowledge.  It  was  incidental  to  this 
larger  purpose  of  Locke  that  he  espoused  Hob- 
bistic  sensationalism,  since  he  found  it  convenient 
to  deny  the  doctrine  of  innate  ideas ;  whence  Locke 
is  sometimes  spoken  of  as  the  successor  of  Hobbes 
and  the  founder  of  French  sensationalism.  Noth- 
ing, I  believe,  could  more  adequately  misrepresent 
Locke's  actual  position  than  such  a  disconnected 
statement.  For  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that 
Locke  anticipated  Kant.  How  Locke  could  an- 
ticipate Kant  and  yet  have  the  reputation  of  be- 
ing a  sensationalist,  it  is  part  of  the  purpose  of 
this  paper  to  show. 

It  is  taken  for  granted  by  our  author  that  no 
one  will  controvert  the  proposition  that  our  minds 
are  stored  with  images,  phantasms,  thoughts,  etc., 
all  of  which  he  begs  the  privilege  of  classifying 
under  the  common  term,  idea.  The  idea  is,  then, 
any  object  of  thought.  That  one's  mind  is  stored 


Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  Introd. 


LOOKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM.  55- 

with  an  endless  variety  of  ideas,  every  man  is 
conscious  to  himself,  and  that  all  other  men  are 
similarly  furnished  in  mind,  more  or  less,  is  ap- 
parent from  what  they  do  and  say.  But  whence 
comes  the  mind  by  this  furniture,  "whence  comes 
it  by  that  vast  store,  which  the  busy  and  boundless 
fancy  of  man  has  painted  on  it  with  an  almost 
endless  variety?"  This  is  the  first  task  for  the 
philosopher  who  would  discipline  the  human  mind 
and  bring  it  to  know  its  limitations.  And  it  is  to 
this  great  task  that  our  author  directs  his  atten- 
tion with  a  vigor  that  is  not  usual  among  philoso- 
phers. For  it  is  by  means  of  Hobbistie  sensation- 
alism that  Locke  would  make  his  first  point  against 
dogmatism. 

That  some  men  hold  somewhat  after  the  manner 
of  Plato  that  certain  ideas,  or  principles,  are  di- 
vinely implanted  in  the  human  mind,  is  a  matter 
that  our  author  may  have  at  first  regarded  as  of 
no  great  consequence.  That  is,  if  it  be  true,  as 
seems  to  be  the  case,  that  the  first  book  of  his 
Essay  was  written  last.  For  if  it  can  be  shown, 
as  Locke  undertakes  to  do,  "How  men,  barely  by 
the  use  of  their  natural  faculties,  may  attain  to 
all  the  knowledge  they  have,  without  the  help  of 
innate  impressions,"  then,  by  the  law  of  parsi- 
mony, the  theory  of  innate  ideas  ceases  to  be  a 
fruitful  one.  Although  he  does  take  this  position 
at  one  time  in  his  Essay,  and  notwithstanding  the- 
fact  that  it  is  one  that  he  could  have  maintained 
with  perfect  consistency,  he  later  adds  the  first 


56  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

book  of  his  famous  Essay  in  direct  refutation  of 
the  doctrine  of  innate  ideas,  which  in  the  light  of 
the  above  seems  to  be  a  work  of  supererogation. 
Perhaps  the  real  explanation  of  why  he  added  this 
first  book  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  work  is  more 
than  a  philosopher's  treatise, — it  is  also  a  polemic. 
In  that  case  we  may  regard  the  first  book  as  a 
vigorous  and  direct  stroke  at  certain  prominent 
upholders  of  the  intuitional  doctrine  in  his  day,— 
not  Des  Cartes,  with  whom  Locke  is  in  harmony, 
but  stragglers  after  good  old  Ralph  Cudworth,who 
so  successfully  "confuted  the  Scottish  atheists, " 
Hobbes  and  others.  Add  to  this  Locke's  genuine 
antipathy  for  the  doctrine,  which  he  felt  very 
strongly  tended  to  hamper  freedom  of  thought, 
and  we  have  sufficient  explanation  of  the  publica 
tion  of  the  first  book. 

Looked  at  from  one  aspect  Locke 's  flat  denial  of 
the  doctrine  of  innate  ideas  is  indeed  a  revolution- 
ary step;  it  so  functioned  in  his  day  and  genera- 
tion and  consequently  it  has  so  been  treated  by  all 
historians  of  philosophy.  But  if  one  views  it  in 
the  light  of  the  general  advance  of  thought,  this 
attack  seems  to  have  come  late.  The  destructive 
work  had  already  been  successfully  consummated 
in  the  constructive  work  of  Hobbes.  It  must  fur- 
ther be  noted  that  Locke  in  a  great  measure  mis- 
understood the  doctrine  of  innate  ideas,  just  as 
the  intuitionalists  misunderstood  Locke's  posi- 
tion. If  I  understand  the  argument  of  Locke, 
what  he  attacks  few  intuitionalists  would  really 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM.  57 

care  to  defend ;  while  what  he  claims  in  a  positive 
way  was  certainly  misunderstood.  Locke  attacks 
the  doctrine  that  the  soul  comes  into  the  world 
ready  to  think,  that  the  mind  is  furnished  with 
ideas  and  is  capable  of  thinking  and  knowing  in- 
dependent of  sensation*  This  is  a  doctrine  that 
Ralph  Cudworth  certainly  would  not  have  cared  to 
defend.  On  the  other  hand,  Locke  did  not  mean 
to  deny  to  the  mind  a  certain  kind  of  activity1 
native  to  it.  Indeed,  he  distinctly  asserts  this 
in  more  than  one  place.  The  intuitional  theory 
that  Locke  attacks  is  one  all  his  own,  just  as  the 
sensationalism  that  he  defends  is  one  all  his  own ; 
in  either  case  he  was  out  of  harmony  with  the  gen- 
erally accepted  doctrine. 

The  contrast  between  Locke  and  Hobbes  upon 
this  one  point  in  regard  to  which  they  are  gen- 
erally supposed  to  be  in  agreement  cannot  be 
stressed  too  much;  for  it  is  of  great  significance. 
Hobbes '  denial  of  innate  ideas  is  not  direct;  it 
comes  incidental  to  his  statement  of  a  construc- 
tive program.  Locke's  denial  of  innate  ideas 
is  flat  and  direct;  and  it  is  made  the  basis  of  his 
attack  upon  the  unbounding  confidence  in  mind 
and  its  capabilities  so  characteristic  of  dogma- 
tism. Strangely  enough  the  apparently  destruc- 
tive work  of  Locke  in  the  end  proves  reactionary, 
while  Hobbes'  denial  of  intuitionalism  incidental 
to  his  constructive  program  more  sucessfully  un- 
dermines that  ancient  theory  than  the  work  of 


58  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

Locke.  The  position  of  Locke,  of  course,  was 
not  well  defined.  His  introduction  of  sensational- 
ism to  replace  intuitionalism,  clinging  as  he  did 
to  Des  Cartes '  res  cogitans,  a  mind  active 
through  natural  faculties,  is  highly  inconsistent. 
While  Locke  made  a  great  noise  over  it  all,  he 
was  anything  but  thorough-going  in  his  accept- 
ance of  sensationalism.  The  slightest  movement 
in  this  direction  is,  of  course,  thoroughly  incon- 
sistent with  his  whole  position.  Furthermore, 
having  destroyed  so  respected  a  theory  as  the  doc- 
trine of  innate  ideas,  he  replaces  it  with  nothing 
better  than  natural  faculties  through  which  the 
mind  works,  the  mind  being  active  from  the  first. 
And  this  active  mind  is  by  far  the  most  import- 
ant element  in  his  doctrine.  That  is  to  say, 
Locke's  return  to  the  past  is  of  a  subtle  nature; 
he  attempts  to  re-interpret  intuitionalism  in 
terms  of  sensationalism.  Hobbes,  on  the  other 
hand,  does  not  come  at  mind  from  the  standpoint 
of  the  past,  but  through  the  term  imagination; 
mind  is  mental  images,  images  are  motion,  and 
motion  explains  the  mind's  activity,  its  power  of 
retention  and  union.  All  of  these  are  signifi- 
cantly left  to  the  powers  of  mind  by  Locke;  they 
are  its  faculties. 

At  the  very  outset,  Locke  makes  his  position 
upon  this  point  clear  and  it  becomes  increasingly 
clear  as  his  work  advances.  Even  primary  per- 
ception is  dependent  upon  the  mind's  activity: 


LOOKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM.  59 


"This  is  certain,  that  whatever  alterations  are  made  in 
the  body,  if  they  reach  not  the  mind;  whatever  impres- 
sions are  made  on  the  outward  parts,  if  they  are  not  taken 
notice  of  within,  there  is  no  perception.  *  *  *  How 
often  may  a  man  observe  in  himself,  that  whilst  his  mind 
is  intently  employed  in  the  contemplation  of  some  objects, 
and  curiously  surveying  some  ideas  that  are  there,  it 
takes  no  notice  of  impressions  of  sounding  bodies  made 
upon  the  organ  of  hearing,  with  the  same  alteration  that 
uses  to  be  for  the  producing  of  the  idea  of  sound?  A 
sufficient  impulse  there  may  be  on  the  organ;  but  it 
not  reaching  the  observation  of  the  mind,  there  follows 
no  perception:  and  though  the  motion  that  uses  to  pro- 
duce the  idea  of  sound  be  made  in  the  ear,  yet  no  sound 
is  heard."  C1) 


No  objection  could  be  found  to  this  statement  in 
its  proper  connection  ;  he  is  accurately  describing 
what  takes  place  in  perception.  So,  likewise,  a 
few  paragraphs  later,  he  makes  still  clearer  the 
mind's  power  to  order  our  sensation  and  percep- 
tions so  as  to  interpret  them  correctly;  how  what 
should  really  appear  flat  is  made  by  the  mind 
to  appear  round.  But  Locke  does  not  make  clear, 
after  the  manner  of  Hobbes,  that  what  we  have 
is  sense  correcting  sense,  although  he  has  every* 
opportunity  to  do  so  in  his  work.  And  it  is  in 
looking  at  the  above  passage  in  the  light  of  all 
that  he  has  to  say  that  its  full  meaning  is  brought 
out.  The  mind,  independent,  originative,  is 
possessed  of  natural  faculties;  it  waits  merely 
for  the  objects  of  thought  to  be  gained  through 
sensation  by  means  of  these  natural  faculties. 
That  there  are  no  innate  ideas  means  simply  that 


Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  Bk.  II,  Chap.  IX, 
Pars.  3  and  4. 


60  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

ideas  cannot  exist  before  sensation;  there  must 
be  action  upon  the  senses  by  some  stimuli,  motions 
of  external  objects,  first  of  all.  Nihil  est  in  in- 
tellectu  quod  non  antea  fuerit  in  sensu;  for  the 
mind  is  an  unwritten  sheet,  tabula  rasa,  antece- 
dent to  sensation.  We  do  not  think,  we  do  not 
know,  before  sensation  for  the  good  reason  that 
we  have  nothing  to  think  and  nothing  to  know; 
but  not  because  there  is  no  mind. 

It  is  quite  evident  that  Locke's  ill-defined  posi 
tion  here  is  capable  of  being  stressed  in  two  quite 
different  ways,  leading  to  two  entirely  different 
interpretations  of  his  philosophy.  If  Locke  is 
denying  the  mind's  original  activity  in  his  state- 
ment that  there  are  no  innate  ideas,  then 
Condillac  and  his  school  have  carried  Locke  to  his 
implicit  conclusions.  If  on  the  other  hand  Locke 
in  declaring  that  the  mind 's  activity  waits  on  sen- 
sation be  an  assertion  of  the  mind's  activity,  then 
Kant  is  his  true  interpreter.  In  the  one  case, 
Locke,  the  sensationalist,  is  thinking  of  the  brain ; 
in  the  other  he  is  not.  Locke  holds  that  there  is 
a  thinking  substance  in  some  way  connected  with 
us,  in  nature  active  and  opposed  to  passive  mat- 
ter, which,  nevertheless,  in  some  way  ordered  of 
God  must  be  awakened  into  its  activity  by  sensa- 
tion. As  to  the  nature  of  this  substance  he  is  not 
sure;  it  may  even  be  material,  since  it  is  within 
the  power  of  Divinity  to  endow  matter  in  such  a 
way  as  to  oppose  it  to  base  matter  by  the  mere 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM.  61 

fact  of  this  endowment.  It  is  clear  that  Locke's 
effort  to  take  the  middle  road  between  Hobbes 
and  Cudworth  places  him  in  a  position  not  easily 
defended.  We  must  simply  take  his  word  for  it 
that  a  mind  has  no  more  to  be  always  thinking  to 
exist  than  a  stomach  has  always  to  be  digesting 
to  exist ;  as  the  one  waits  for  food  the  other  may 
wait  on  sensation  for  its  objects  of  thought.  In 
other  words  thought  is  not  the  essence  of  mind 
for  Locke,  but  rather  a  function  of  the  mind  that 
can  be  called  into  play.  But  is  this  position  ten- 
able? Either  thought  is  the  essence  of  mind,  or 
he  must  give  up  his  res  cogitans.  But  Locke 
compromisingly  clings  to  both  sensationalism  and 
Cartesian  dualism.  All  told  this  is  not  surpris- 
ing; for  Locke,  throughout  his  entire  work,  is 
constantly  confusing  the  mind  as  known  to  him  in 
experience  with  his  theoretical  res  cogitans.  That 
the  one  is  contradictory  of  the  other  is  clearly  evi- 
dent. 

If  the  mind  be,  as  our  author  declares,  a  tabula 
rasa, 

"How  comes  it  to  be  furnished?  Whence  comes  it  by 
that  vast  store  which  the  busy  and  boundless  fancy  of 
man  has  painted  on  it  with  an  almost  endless  variety? 
Whence  has  it  all  the  materials  of  reason  and  knowledge?" 
To  this  I  answer,  in  one  word,  from  EXPERIENCE.  In  that 
all  our  knowledge  is  founded  and  from  that  it  ultimately 
derives  itself.  Our  observation  employed  either,  about 
external  sensible  objects,  or  about  the  internal  operations 
of  our  minds  perceived  and  reflected  on  by  ourselves,  is 
that  which  supplies  our  understanding  with  all  the 
materials  of  thinking.  These  two  are  the  fountains  of 


62  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

knowledge,  from  whence  all  the  ideas  that  we  have,  or 
can  naturally  have,  do  spring."  (*) 

It  matters  not  to  what  heights  the  mind  may 
attain  in  all  its  varied  activity,  it  stirs  not  one  jot 
beyond  the  ideas  so  gained.  All  lofty  construc- 
tions of  the  imagination  must  be  reduced  to  these 
same  simple  primary  elements  of  our  knowledge. 
All  of  this,  of  course,  suggests  Hobbes  at  once. 
But  there  is  a  significant  difference  between  them 
even  here.  In  Locke  the  "materials  of  thinking " 
alone  are  gained  from  experience;  while  in 
Hobbes,  on  the  other  hand,  the  mind  itself  is  the 
product  of  experience.  It  is  quite  possible,  there- 
fore, that  Locke,  believing  as  he  did  in  the  mind 
as  the  orderer  of  our  experience,  regarded  his  po- 
sition here  as  independent  of  Hobbes.  Certainly 
it  is  agreed  by  all  critics  that  Locke  reached  his 
^conclusions  from  his  own  observations,  or  he 
would  never  have  tabulated  them  as  his  own. 
Hence  it  would  generally  be  claimed  that  Locke 
was  influenced  by  Hobbes  to  a  very  slight  degree. 
There  is  no  doubt,  however,  but  that  Locke  had 
read  his  Hobbes. 

Experience  is  of  two  kinds ;  that  that  has  to  do 
with  external  sensible  things  and  that  that  has  to 
do  with  the  internal  operations  of  the  mind.  The 
former  is  called  sensation,  while  the  latter  is 
called  reflection.  Sensation  is  antecedent  to  re- 


Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  Book  II,  Chap.  I, 
Par.  2. 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALJSM.  63 

flection.  From  sensation,  "such  an  impression, 
or  motion  made  in  the  parts  of  the  body  as  pro- 
duces some  perception  in  the  understanding, "  the 
most  of  our  ideas  spring. 

"Our  senses,  conversant  about  particular  sensible  ob- 
jects, do  convey  into  the  mind  several  distinct  perceptions 
of  things,  according  to  those  various  ways  wherein  those 
objects  do  affect  them.  And  thus  we  come  by  those  ideas 
we  do  have  of  yellow,  white,  cold,  heat,  soft,  hard,  bitter, 
sweet,  and  all  those  which  are  called  sensible  qualities; 
which  when  I  say  the  senses  convey  into  the  mind  I  mean, 
they  from  external  objects  convey  into  the  mind  what  pro- 
duces there  those  perceptions.  *  *  *  (The)  other  foun- 
tain from  which  experience  furnisheth  the  understanding 
with  ideas,"  reflection,  "that  notice  that  the  mind  takes  of 
its  own  states  and  operations,  by  which  it  has  ideas  of  the 
same/'C1) 

sustains  in  a  measure  the  same  relation  to  our 
mental  operations  that  sensation  does  to  external 
sensible  objects. 

Here  in  reflection  we  find  the  same  activity  of 
the  mind  that  was  stressed  a  few  pages  back  in 
primary  perception.  The  mind  is  active  in  the 
same  way  in  the  perception  of  sensations  that  it 
is  in  the  perception  of  mental  operations  in  re- 
flection. There  is  no  need  to  stress  that  point 
again  here;  the  difference  is  one  of  degree.  It 
must  be  understood,  however,  that  there  will  be 
found  in  Locke  other  explanations  of  the  mind's 
synthetic  character,  for  he  is  not  always  consist- 
ent. But  not  to  take  note  of  his  position  above 
and  its  significance  would,  it  seems  to  me,  be  to 

(l)  Essay  Concerning  Human   Understanding,   Bk.   II,   C!h.   I, 
Pars.  3  and  4. 


64  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

ultimately  misinterpret  the  general  trend  of 
Locke's  message  in  psychology.  Quite  generally 
commentors  of  Locke  are  misleading  here.  They 
say  that  the  mind  is  passive  in  the  reception  of 
simple  ideas  and  active  in  the  creation  of  com- 
plex ones.  And  this  is  just  what  Locke  does  say 
at  one  place,  but  Locke's  general  position  cannot 
be  got  at  through  that  one  statement.  Through- 
out the  whole  of  his  psychology  there  is  a  con- 
tinual assumption  of  the  mind  as  an  independent, 
self-existent,  active  entity,  marshalling  sensa- 
tions and  ideas  alike.  The  mind  may  be  said  to 
be  unconscious  in  its  action  in  primary  percep- 
tion, in  which  case  Locke  suggests  the  petites 
perceptions  of  Leibnitz  or  anticipates  the  Kantian 
doctrine  as  to  the  unconscious  activity  of  the  im- 
agination in  perception.  Indeed,  the  function  of 
Locke's  understanding  is  in  a  great  way  given 
over  to  that  of  the  imagination  in  Kant.  Their 
activity  in  primary  perception  in  the  interpre- 
tation of  independent  sensation  is  one  and  the 
same.  If  the  commentors  mean  merely  to  say 
that  the  mind  is  relatively  passive  in  the  recep- 
tion of  simple  ideas,  that  is,  as  compared  with  its 
activity  in  the  creation  of  complex  ones,  why  that 
is  quite  correct.  But  my  contention  is  that  com- 
mentators in  stressing  the  importance  of  Locke's 
revolutionary  doctrine  fail  to  notice  the  import- 
ance of  his  reactionary  trend.  Locke  simply  took 
for  granted  his  soul  with  its  natural  faculties  and 


LOOKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUAIJSM.  65 

original  activity.  To  question  its  existence  never 
so  much  as  entered  his  mind  as  a  reasonable  hy- 
pothesis. In  my  opinion  French  sensationalism 
gave  a  turn  that  would  have  caused  him  sleepless 
nights  could  he  ever  have  fully  realized  it.  The 
fact  that  Locke  says  that  reflection  might  go  by 
the  name  of  an  internal  sense  only  doubles  his 
emphasis  upon  mind.  For  the  mind  whose  atten- 
tion is  necessary  and  presupposed  even  in  primary 
perception  continues  more  and  more  to  display  its 
activity.  It  is  active  in  reflection;  to  its  activity 
are  due  all  our  ideas  whether  they  be  complex 
ideas,  ideas  of  relation  or  ideas  of  abstraction. 
For  as  we  shall  see  later,  the  mind  displays  its 
activity  through  these  natural  faculties,  or  pow- 
ers, of  compounding,  abstracting,  etc. 

To  continue  with  the  statement  of  Locke's  posi- 
tion: 

"These  two,  I  say,  viz.,  external,  material  things,  as  ob- 
jects of  sensation,  and  the  operations  of  our  minds  within, 
as  objects  of  reflection,  are  to  me,  the  only  originals  from 
whence  all  our  ideas  take  their  beginnings."  (*) 

Through  sensation  and  reflection  from  the 
above  named  sources  the  mind  receives  its  simple 
ideas,  the  ultimate  foundation  of  all  our  knowl- 
edge, its  unanalysible  elements,  out  of  which  are 
created  all  other  ideas,  whether  they  be  the  idea 
of  the  self,  the  external  world,  or  God. 


Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  Bk.  II,  Chap    I,. 
Par.  4. 


66  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN    ENGLAND. 

To  examine  sensation.  Any  external  object  of 
which  the  mind  takes  notice  is  for  Locke  posses- 
sed of  certain  real  qualities,  as  solidity,  extension, 
figure,  motion,  and  certain  subjective  qualities. 
The  former  are  inseparable  from  the  external  ob- 
ject and  are  of  its  very  essence,  while  the  latter, 
on  the  contrary,  are  separable  from  the  object 
and,  although  they  are  commonly  supposed  to  re- 
side in  the  object  as  is  the  case  with  primary 
qualities,  just  referred  to,  they  are  for  Locke  ef- 
fects in  the  observer.  The  one  Locke  called  prim- 
ary qualities  and  the  other  secondary,  and  des- 
pite the  fact  that  this  distinction  did  not  originate 
with  Locke,  the  terms  which  he  applied  to  them 
have  taken  a  permanent  place  in  philosophic  dis- 
cussion, a  witness  to  the  important  place  of  their 
author.  Now,  ideas  are  produced  in  the  mind  by 
the  action  of  these  external  bodies  upon  the 
sense,  the  internal  parts  being  set  in  motion  by 
the  particles  of  the  external  bodies,  provided  the 
mind  attends.  That  the  ideas  thus  aroused  in  the 
mind  in  response  to  such  external  stimuli  should 
in  any  wise  resemble  the  external  cause  is  unne- 
cessary and  gratuitous;  they  need  no  more  re- 
semble their  cause  than  words  need  resemble  the 
things  they  name.  Nevertheless,  it  is  quite  true 
that  our  ideas  of  primary  qualities  do  correspond 
to  the  qualities  in  external  bodies,  in  some  way  or 
other,  but  our  ideas  of  secondary  qualities  do  not; 
.these  exist  in  the  things  themselves  only  as  modes 


DOOKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALJSM.  67 

of  primary  qualities.  In  these  statements  Locke 
is  trying  very  hard  to  be  consistent  with  the  ad- 
vance of  science  in  his  day.  Elsewhere  he  writes 
in  the  same  connection  significantly, 

"Ideas  it  is  certain  I  have,  and  God  is  the  original 
cause  of  my  having  them;  but  how  I  came  by  them  *  *  * 
in  this  I  frankly  confess  my  ignorance."  (*) 

Locke's  position  here  is  that  of  an  undogmatic 
mind:  this  is  certainly  beyond  all  question,  but 
it  is  essentially  quite  different  from  that  of 
Hobbes  though  this  may  not  at  first  be  so  appar- 
ent. In  Hobbes  we  have  seen  that  there  is  no  dis- 
position to  make  anything  of  the  Cartesian  prob- 
lem ;  to  a  certain  extent  it  may  be  said  that  Locke 
is  in  the  same  case.  To  his  credit,  he  does  neglect 
the  problem  to  some  extent.  But  this  is  incon- 
sistent with  his  general  attitute  towards  mind ;  for 
mind  and  matter  are  for  him  heterogeneous,  while 
for  Hobbes  they  were  not.  Hobbes,  therefore,  is 
justified  in  his  neglect  of  the  problem,  while  Locke 
is  not.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  we  may  over- 
look the  phenomenology  of  Hobbes,  of  which  some 
have  seen  fit  to  make  to  much  capital.  But  the 
case  of  Locke  is  quite  different.  He  has  not  only 
the  two  worlds  of  mind  and  matter  but  in  agree- 
ing with  Hobbes  that  our  own  ideas  do  not  have 
to  agree  with  their  objects  he  has  introduced  as 
a  veil  a  system  of  ideas  that  intervene  between 


(*)  Examination  of  Malebranche,  Pars.  10-16,  quoted  from  Vol. 
I,  p.  192;  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding. 


68  IDEALJSTIO   BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

his  two  worlds.  The  significance  of  this  three- 
world  position  of  Locke  was  fully  realized  by  Irish 
wit,  when  Berkeley  stepped  from  the  world  of 
matter  by  means  of  this  newly  discovered  world 
of  ideas  into  the  world  of  mind.  Had  it  not  been 
for  Locke's  intervening  ideas,  or  rather  had 
Locke  not  given  the  significance  that  he  did  to 
these  ideas,  there  would  never  have  been  the  ex- 
cuse that  there  undoubtedly  was  for  Berkeley's 
psychological  idealism.  For  it  arises  out  of  the 
simple  Lockean  definition  of  knowledge :  and  how 
it  does  we  shall  see  later  in  our  study  of  Berkeley. 
Let  us  examine  these  ideas  and  their  genesis 
and  see  what  light  they  throw  upon  the  question 
of  Locke,  the  sensationalist,  and  Locke,  the  men- 
talist.  Ideas  are  of  two  kinds :  simple  and  com- 
plex. The  former  constitute  the  unanalysible  ele- 
ments of  all  that  we  know,  or  can  know ;  they  come 
into  the  mind  only  as  above  set  forth  by  sensation 
and  reflection,  outer  and  inner  perception.  As 
was  pointed  out  above,  it  is  usual  to  say  that 
simple  ideas  are  received  by  the  mind  in  a  passive 
state:  whereas  complex  ones  are  the  creation  of 
the  mind's  own  activity.  There  can  be  no  objec- 
tion to  this  statement  of  the  case  so  long  as  it  is 
remembered  that  the  mind  is  always  potentially 
active  for  Locke,  and  never  passive  when  it  has 
something  to  think  or  know.  Eelatively,  then,  the 
mind  is  passive  here  in  contradistinction  to  its 
greater  activity  in  the  higher  mental  processes, 
or  what  he  calls  natural  faculties.  Simple  ideas 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUAUSM.  69 

are  received  either  from  without  or  within,  when 
the  mind  attends  to  some  object,  external  or  men- 
tal; complex  ideas  are  constructs  of  the  mind, 
formed  out  of  simple  ideas,  with  which  the  mind 
has  the  power  by  means  of  its  faculties  to  deal 
as  it  will.  It  may  construct  the  most  lofty  con- 
ceptions, the  most  sublime  ideas,  but  the  most  ex- 
alted wit  cannot  come  at  a  simple  idea  by  any 
other  method  than  that  of  reception  through  sen- 
sation and  reflection.  As  the  mind  has  no  power 
to  create  a  simple  idea,  so  likewise  it  has  no  power 
to  destroy  one.  Simple  ideas  come  into  the  mind 
through  one  sense,  through  several  senses,  by  re- 
flection, and  by  reflection  and  sensation  together. 
Thus  the  primary  quality,  solidity,  comes  into 
the  mind  by  the  single  sense,  touch;  by  reflection 
alone  we  come  into  the  possession  of  the  ideas  of 
willing  and  thinking,  while  by  reflection  and  sen- 
sation we  gain  the  idea  of  power,  pain  and  others. 
Simple  ideas  are  subject  to  certain  limitations; 
these  one  must  gain  and  must  gain  them  as  they 
are  given  in  his  experience,  they  cannot  be  altered. 
On  the  other  hand  in  the  case  of  complex  ideas, 
the  mind  is  free  and  originative.  It  can  proceed 
as  it  will ;  for  the  reason  that  our  complex  ideas 
do  not  have  to  conform  to  external  objects.  Simple 
ideas  are  real,  adequate  and,  for  the  most  part, 
true ;  while  on  the  other  hand  complex  ideas  need 
not  be  either  real  or  adequate  or  true.  Both 
simple  and  complex  ideas  may  be  either  clear  or 


70  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN    ENGLAND. 

obscure;  simple  ideas  in  the  strength  and  fresh- 
ness of  their  reception  into  the  mind  are  certainly 
clear,  though  if  the  perception  is  imperfect,  or  the 
memory  weak,  they  may  be  obscure.  Complex 
ideas  are  dependent  upon  simple  ones  for  their 
clearness.  The  validity  of  all  science  rests  upon 
the  validity  of  simple  ideas. 

Of  the  ideas  classified  above,  simple  ideas  are 
the  work  of  the  mind  and  sense ;  nothing  is  clearer 
than  this.  While  sensation  is  necessary  for  the 
possibility  of  ideas;  their  coming  into  being  de- 
pends, as  we  have  seen,  upon  the  activity  of  the 
mind.  The  mind  must  attend  in  sensation  that 
we  may  have  simple  ideas  at  all  just  as  it  must 
attend  in  reflection  that  we  may  have  simple  ideas. 
All  other  ideas  are  the  product  of  the  mind  alone. 
The  position  of  Locke  here  suggests  that  of  Kant 
whose  faculty  of  imagination  organizes  not  only 
perceptions  under  the  pure  forms  of  the  mind, 
but  even  the  crude  data  of  sensation  under  the 
forms  of  space  and  time.  In  Locke  as  well  as  in 
Kant  simple  and  complex  ideas  alike  are  the  work 
of  mind.  In  the  one  the  mind  acts  through  na- 
tural faculties,  while  in  the  other  the  mind  has 
as  its  instruments  forms. 

Here  we  come  to  that  part  of  the  work  of  Locke 
which,  while  it  may  be  merely  a  matter  of  em- 
phasis, seems  to  me  to  be  much  more  than  this,. 
Locke's  careful  treatment  of  the  faculties  of  mind, 
which  marks  him  off  clearly  from  Hobbes.  They 


LOOKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALJSM.  71 

are  for  Locke  something  more  than  mere  names 
for  the  manner  images  play  in  the  mind.  While 
Locke  is  careful  to  have  us  understand  that  they 
are  not  beings  or  agents,  he  discusses  them  as 
powers  of  the  mind.  Here  again  we  come  upon 
Locke's  leaning  toward  intuitionalism  as  against 
Hobbes'  thorough-going  materialism.  The  mat- 
ter may  be  approached  in  two  ways:  through  a 
consideration  of  the  thinking  substance,  and  that 
of  the  law  of  association.  An  emphasis  upon  mind 
substance  to  the  exclusion  of  a  formal  explana- 
tion of  mind  seems  to  make  it  clear  that  Locke 
can  have  but  one  meaning  for  faculties. 

What  this  thinking  substance  is,  we  do  not 
know  and  cannot  know,  but  one  of  two  things 
is  true:  either  it  is  an  immaterial  substance 
superadded  to  matter,  or  it  is  matter.  It  rests  as 
much  with  spiritualists  to  show  why  their  hypothe- 
sis is  acceptable  as  it  does  with  materialists  to 
show  that  theirs  is. 

"For  I  see  no  contradiction  in  it,  that  the  first  Eternal 
thinking  Being  should,  if  He  pleased,  give  to  certain  sys- 
tems of  created  senseless  matter,  put  together  as  He 
thinks  fit,  some  degrees  of  sense,  perception  and 
thought,"  C1) 

but,  he  significantly  adds, 

"Though,  as  I  think  I  have  proved,  it  is  no  less  than  a 
contradiction  to  suppose  matter  (which  is  evidently  in  its 
own  nature  void  of  sense  and  thought)  should  be  that 
eternal  first  thinking  Being",  C1) 


Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  Bk.  IV,  Ch.  Ill, 
Par.  6. 


72  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN    ENGLAND. 

which  so  far  as  I  can  see  rests  Locke's  case.  Still 
he  would  retain  an  open  mind  in  the  matter,  as 
may  be  seen : 

"It  is  a  point  which  seems  to  me  to  be  put  out  ol 
reach  of  our  knowledge,"  (*) 

but,  he  adds,  because  we  find  one  hypothesis  in- 
conceivable that  is  no  reason  for  throwing  our- 
selves violently  into  the  contrary  one,  which  is 
"an  unfair  way  some  men  take  with  themselves". 
When  Locke  has  completed  his  consideration 
his  position  is  no  longer  in  doubt,  despite  the  fact 
that  he  professes  an  open  mind.  He  defends  the 
Cartesian  res  cogitans,  as  we  have  already  had 
opportunity  to  discover.  And  it  is  in  this  think- 
ing substance  that  we  find  the  originative  powers 
of  union,  abstraction,  comparing,  etc.  For  these 
are  the  instruments  of  the  directing  mind  and  it 
is  through  these  powers  that  its  activity  is  dis- 
played. It  has  been  claimed  above  that  these  are 
not,  as  they  were  with  Hobbes,  merely  names  for 
the  behavior  of  mind,  purely  descriptive  in  nature, 
though  they  do  have  this  character  also.  Indeed, 
it  must  be  here  understood  once  and  for  all  that 
Locke  here  as  elsewhere  accurately  describes  the 
mind's  activities;  the  fault  is  to  be  found  not  so 
much  with  Locke's  description  as  with  his  theory. 
It  is  contended  that  the  very  fact  that  Locke  feels 
it  necessary  merely  to  describe  these  activities  as 

*(*)  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  Bk.  IV,  Ch.  Ill, 
Par.  6. 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUATJSM.  73 

faculties  makes  clear  his  theory  of  mind.  He 
could  have  gone  into  a  causal  explanation  of  men- 
tal phenomena.  Notice  how  carefully  Hobbes  ex- 
plains retention  in  terms  of  images  that  persist 
through  the  law  of  motion;  how  carefully  he  ex- 
plains the  mind's  synthetic  activity  in  terms  of 
the  law  of  association  of  ideas.  What  has  Locke 
to  say  here?  These  are  all  powers,  or  natural 
faculties,  that  the  mind  has  through  which  and  in 
which,  its  activities  are  made  manifest.  Here 
again  Locke  betrays  his  mentalism. 

But  most  striking  of  all  the  neglected  oppor- 
tunities that  presented  themselves  to  Locke  by 
which  he  might  have  made  his  position  clear,  is 
that  of  his  failure  to  employ  the  principal  of  as- 
sociation. It  cannot  be  said  that  he  was  unac- 
quainted with  this  law;  for  in  a  negative  way  he 
calls  particular  attention  to  it,  when  considering 
its  unfortunate  aspect  as  displayed  in  the  "con- 
nection of  ideas  wholly  owing  to  chance  and  cus- 
tom "  and  the  ill  effects  that  flow  from  these  as- 
sociations of  a  peculiarly  subjective  character. 
It  may  be  that  Locke  did  not  emphasize  the  law 
in  a  positive  way  for  the  reason  that  he  antici- 
pated what  Hume  later  did.  For  the  method  that 
Locke  uses  to  explain  subjective  coherence 
is  the  same  that  Hume  used  to  explain 
all  creations  of  the  imagination  including 
Locke's  self,  external  world  and  Creator. 
However  that  may  be  it  is  found  that  in 


74  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

most  cases  Locke  concealed  the  operation  of 
this  law  under  other  names,  but  principally  un- 
der the  faculties  of  the  thinking  substance.  If 
Locke  did  not  understand  the  full  significance  of 
this  law,  the  reason  that  he  did  not  is  plain  enough, 
his  predilections  in  favor  of  the  Cartesian  res 
cogitans  and  his  good  intuitionalism  (despite  his 
wonderful  assault  on  innate  ideas),  really  left  no 
place  for  such  a  law  in  his  psychology.  In  this 
connection  it  may  be  noted  that  interesting  light 
is  here  thrown  on  Locke's  attitude  towards  the 
principle  by  his  introductory  words : 

"Some  of  our  ideas  have  a  natural  correspondence  and 
connection  one  with  another;  it  is  the  office  and  excellency 
or  our  reason  to  trace  these,  and  to  hold  them  together 
in  that  union  and  correspondence  which  is  founded  in 
their  particular  beings.  Besides  this  there  is  another 
connection  of  ideas  wholly  owing  to  chance  or  custom." 

That  is  to  say,  the  true  ideas  though  gained  from 
sensation  and  the  correspondence  between  them 
can  be  intuited  by  the  reason  just  as  the  innate 
ideas  of  Ralph  Cudworth  were.  One  of  the  prime 
functions  of  the  reason  is  to  preserve  the  integ- 
rity of  this  agreement  against  the  on-slaughts  of 
false  connections  "  wholly  owing  to  chance  and 
custom".  The  intuitionalism  of  Locke  has  been 
noticed  by  more  than  one  commentator.  A  more 
definite  statement  of  it  could  hardly  be  called  for. 
It  is  generally  thought  that  Locke,  far  from  be- 
ing an  adherent  of  the  faculty  psychology,  actually 

(*)  Essay    Concerning    Human    Understanding,    Bk.    II,    Ch. 
XXXIII,  Par.  5. 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM.  75 

did  much  in  opposition  to  such  a  doctrine.  This, 
it  must  be  admitted,  is  partially  true.  Locke  did 
attack  the?  theory  that  a  mental  faculty  is  an  in- 
dependent agent.  Here,  as  in  the  case  of  his  at- 
tack upon  the  theory  of  innate  ideas,  he  attacks 
not  the  genuine  theory,  but  a  popular  misconcep- 
tion of  it.  His  position  is  made  clear  in  a  dis- 
cussion of  volition : 

"But  in  all  these  it  is  not  one  power  that  operates  on 
another:  but  it  is  the  mind  that  operates,  and  exerts  these 
powers;  it  is  the  man  that  does  the  action;  it  is  the  agent 
that  has  power,  or  is  able  to  do.  For  powers  are  relations, 
not  agents,"  etc.  (*) 

V\  hile  these  words  have  a  particular  pertinency 
in  his  discussion  of  freedom,  their  bearing  upon 
the  general  position  is  quite  apparent.  For  the 
agent,  or  man,  is  always  identified  with  his  active 
directing  mind. 

The  activity  of  the  mind  observed  in  perception 
is  more  and  more  evident  the  higher  the  faculties 
discussed.  Primary  perception  man  has  in  com- 
mon with  all  animals  of  the  field;  but  the  faculty 
of  abstraction  belongs  to  man  alone,  and  is  highly 
developed  only  in  men  of  great  intellectual  power. 

Perception  is  "the  first  operation  of  all  intel- 
lectual faculties,  and  the  inlet  of  all  knowledge  in 
our  minds'7.  The  understanding  displays  its- 
power  in  perception  of  ideas,  in  the  perception 
of  the  signification  of  signs,  in  the  perception  of 
the  agreement  or  disagreement  of  our  ideas.  The 

C1)  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  Bk.  II,  Ch.  XXI. 


76  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

powers  here  set  forth  are  those  of  the  understand- 
ing proper.  There  is  another  power  that 
shares  with  the  understanding  the  activi- 
ties of  the  soul,  namely,  the  will.  It 
is  from  the  observation  of  these  faculties  that  the 
mind  derives  the  idea  of  power.  How  Locke's  use 
of  these  powers  has  led  him  to  emphasize  the 
mind's  activity  has  already  been  referred  to. 

Eetention  is  a  power  that  the  mind  has  of  keep- 
ing ideas  actually  under  observation,  called  con- 
templation. The  mind  also  has  "the  power  to 
revive  again  in  our  minds  those  ideas  which,  after 
imprinting  have  disappeared".  Thus  what  con- 
stitutes the  essence  of  mind  for  Hobbes,  namely 
its  conservation  of  experience,  is  for  Locke  merely 
a  power  of  mind.  But  memory  must  not  be  liter- 
ally interpreted  as  a  storehouse  of  ideas;  Locke 
carefully,  if  naively,  fortifies  himself  against  any 
such  in  the  following  words : 

"This  laying  up  of  our  ideas  in  the  repository  of  the 
memory  signifies  no  more  but  this, — that  the  mind  has  a 
power  in  many  cases  to  revive  perceptions  which  it  has 
had  once,  with  this  additional  perception  annexed  to  them, 
that  it  has  had  them  before.  *  *  *  They  (ideas)  are 
actually  nowhere;  but  only  there  is  an  ability  in  the  mind 
when  it  will  to  revive  them  again",  etc.O 

While  this  is  true,  there  are  cases  where  this 
power  of  the  mind  is  useless;  for  the  ideas  have 
disappeared. 


Essay  Concerning  Human    Understanding,    Bk.  II,    Ch.  X, 
Par.  2. 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM.  77 

"Thus  the  ideas,  as  well  as  children,  of  our  youth,  often 
die  before  us;  and  our  minds  represent  to  us  those  tombs 
to  which  we  are  approaching;  where,  though  the  brass 
and  marble  remain,  yet  the  inscriptions  are  effaced  by 
time,  and  the  imagery  moulders  away.  The  pictures  drawn 
in  our  minds  are  laid  in  fading  colours;  and  if  not  some- 
times refreshed,  vanish  and  disappear." (') 

Locke  contends  that  our  ideas  disappear ;  this  was 
for  him  a  matter  of  common  experience,  and  one 
that  could  not  be  controverted.  Here,  in  a  way, 
he  opposed  Hobbes,  While  our  author  contends 
that  ideas  decay,  Hobbes,  on  the  other  hand,  - 
holds  that  our  ideas  would  never  decay  in  fact, 
but  that  to  say  that  they  decay  is  merely  another 
way  of  saying  that  they  are  crowded  out  of  the 
field  of  consciousness  by  other  and  newer  impres- 
sions only  for  the  time  being;  their  persistence  in 
the  mind  being  due  to  the  fundamental  law  of  mo- 
tion, the  motion  of  the  internal  parts  of  the  body 
must  be  counteracted  by  other  new  motions  from 
without  or  the  internal  parts  themselves  must 
have  been  destroyed.  This  retention  of  images  is 
the  essence  of  mind  for  Hobbes ;  it  is  merely  a 
power,  or  the  accident,  of  mind  for  Locke.  The 
Hobbistic  theory  of  mind  as  a  moving  sea  of 
images  serves  him  in  good  stead  when  he  comes 
to  explain  what  is  for  Locke  a  strange  pheno- 
menon, that  is,  how  ideas 

"start  up  in  our  minds  of  their  own  accord  and  offer  them- 
selves to  the  understanding;   and  very  often  are  roused 


(*)  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,    Bk.  II,  Ch.  X, 
Par.  5. 


78  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

and  tumbled  out  of  their  dark  cells  into  open  daylight,  by 
turbulent  and  tempestuous  passions. "(*) 

This  our  author  allows  to  disturb  him  very  little ; 
the  instances  that  are  met  with  belong  to  the  mind 
in  a  relaxed  state.  In  an  active  state  the  mind 
orders  to  the  fore  certain  dormant  ideas  through 
the  power  of  the  will,  or  even  seeks  out  some  hid- 
den idea  by  a  careful  search.  All  of  which  goes 
to  show  that  Locke  in  his  discussion  of  the  reten- 
tion of  ideas  and  their  recurrence  in  the  mind 
is  disposed  to  assign  to  the  power  of  an  unan- 
alysed  conception  their  control,  which  is  in  strik- 
ing contrast  with  Hobbes  in  his  careful  analysis 
of  mental  control.  Locke  points  out  carefully  the 
value  of  memory,  without  which  man  would  be 
helpless ;  but  not  once  does  he  seem  to  appreciate 
the  conception  of  mind  as  being  essentially  mem- 
ory. 

Very  different  from  the  faculties  discussed 
above  are  those  of  discerning,  comparing  and 
compounding.  The  function  of  perception  and  re- 
tention was  to  receive  and  keep  the  ideas  with 
which  the  last  three  faculties  are  to  deal  in  quite 
different  ways.  Discernment  is  that  power  of  the 
mind  that  enables  it  to  distinguish  clearly  between 
ideas;  its  importance  cannot  be  overestimated. 

"On  this  faculty  of  distinguishing  one  thing  from  an- 
other depends  the  evidence  and  certainty  of  several,  even 
very  general  propositions,  which  have  passed  for  innate 


(')  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,    Bk.   II,  Ch.  X, 
Par.  7. 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUALISM.  79 

truths;  because  men,  overlooking  the  true  cause  why 
those  propositions  find  universal  assent  impute  it  wholly 
to  native  uniform  impressions;  whereas  it  in  truth  de- 
pends upon  this  clear  discerning  faculty  of  the  mind, 
whereby  it  perceives  two  ideas  to  be  the  same,  or  differ- 
ent." (') 

Are  we  any  wiser  for  such  a  discussion  of  this 
faculty  ?  Without  in  any  way  denying  that  Locke 
made  a  positive  contribution  here  it  is  just  as 
evident  that  for  him  the  sensation  of  difference  is 
a  non-sensuous  element.  This  is  one  of  the  divid- 
ing lines  between  intuitionalism  and  sensational- 
ism and  Locke  is  plainly  on  the  side  of  intuition. 

Comparing  is  that  power  of  the  mind  whereby 
it  compares  its  ideas  one  with  another  in  res- 
pect of  extent,  degree,  time,  place,  or  any  other 
circumstance  upon  which  are  dependent  all  that 
large  tribe  of  ideas  comprehended  under  rela- 
tion, which  is  of  vast  extent,  as  our  author  make's 
clear.  But  here  again  Locke  makes  it  clear  that  re- 
lation belongs  to  ideas  in  the  mind  which  is  in- 
tuited by  the  mind  as  it  examines  and  compares 
its  ideas. 

Compounding  is  that  power  of  the  mind  where- 
by it  joins  together  simple  ideas  received  from 
sensation  and  reflection,  creating  thereby  complex 
ideas.  Under  this  head  is  included  the  enlarging 
of  ideas,  which  is  simply  the  combining  of  ideas 
of  the  same  kind,  not  at  first  apparent.  Here,  as 
has  been  pointed  out  above,  Locke  misses  a  most 

(*) Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding.  Bk.  II,  Chap.  XI, 
Par.  1. 


80  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

excellent  opportunity  to  employ  to  advantage  the 
principle  of  association  of  ideas  with  which  he 
was  certainly  not  unfamiliar.  The  theory  that  one 
experience  has  the  power  to  call  up  another  and 
that  this  is  the  fundamental  basis  of  mind  would, 
I  feel,  have  been  repulsive  to  Locke,  whose  whale 
work  is  so  closely  allied  with  the  conception  of 
an  undivided  active  thinking  substance. 

The  highest  faculty  of  the  mind  is  that  of  ab- 
straction, the  power  that  the  mind  has  of  separat- 
ing the  ideas  that  it  has  joined,  or  found  joined, 
in  some  particular  thing  as  perceived  by  the 
mind.  Whiteness  belongs  both  to  snow  and  chalk 
and  can  be  abstracted  from  them.  This  the  mind 
does  of  necessity ;  but  for  this  faculty  of  abstrac- 
tion, says  Locke,  names  would  be  endless.  This 
is  the  power  of  mind  that  marks  man  off  from  the 
brute  just  as  perception,  according  to  Locke, 
marks  all  sentient  creatures  off  from  lower  forms 
of  life.  Here  again  Locke  plainly  avoids  a  scien- 
tific explanation  of  the  behavior  of  the  mind. 
What  might  have  been  gone  into  and  analysed  is 
lumped  as  a  power  of  mind.  Locke's  conception 
of  an  abstract  idea  as  a  mental  construction  is 
enough  to  convict  him  of  mentalism  even  if  there 
were  no  other  data  at  our  disposal. 

It  can  hardly  be  said  Locke  placed  much  em- 
phasis upon  the  atomistic  character  of  our  sen- 
suous experience,  certainly  not  after  the  manner 
of  Hume.  His  conception  of  substance,  whether 


LOCKE:  OPEN-MINDED  DUAUSM.  81 

material  or  spiritual,  held  within  it  sufficient  ex- 
planation of  how  qualities  are  held  together. 
Bather  did  he  emphasize  the  mere  fact  that  sen- 
sation is  a  necessary  element  in  experience  and 
this  he  did  in  a  manner  in  no  wise  different  either 
from  his  predecessor,  Ealph  Cudworth,  with 
whose  doctrines  he  must  have*  been  most  thor- 
oughly familiar,  or  from  his  renowned  successor, 
Immanuel  Kant.  But,  as  we  have  clearly  shown, 
the  non-sensuous  element  in  Locke  is  greatly  pre- 
dominant. This  he  has  made  clear  in  two  ways: 
by  the  continual  emphasis  upon  the  mind  as  an  un- 
divided, original,  active,  directing  substance  and 
by  his  disposition  to  stress  the  non-sensory  ele- 
ment in  his  discussion  of  the  faculties,  or  powers, 
of  mind.  Locke  clearly  anticipated  Kant,  and  the 
chief  element  of  difference  that  distinguishes  the 
work  of  Kant  from  that  of  Locke  is  that  that  was 
introduced  by  his  two  successors,  Berkeley  and 
Hume. 


III. 

BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM. 


Of   THE 

UNIVERSITY 


III. 

BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM. 

Berkeley,  like  many  other  young  men  of  his 
time,  was  led  into  philosophy  through  the  reading 
of  Locke.  And  yet  two  minds  could  not  have  been 
more  unlike  than  those  of  Berkeley  and  Locke; 
Berkeley  did  not  have  that  openness  of  mind  so 
characteristic  of  Locke.  The  position  of  compro- 
mise that  Locke  had  taken  was  not  for  him. 
Locke's  reference  of  the  secondary  qualities  to 
the  sentient  mind  as  well  as  his  broad  use  of  the 
term  idea  at  once  suggested  to  Berkeley's  mind 
further  development.  Where  Locke  had  restrain- 
ed thought  to  those  things  that  the  mind  seemed 
capable  of  dealing  with,  Berkeley  gave  wings  to 
his  fancy.  Locke's  Critique  of  the  Human  Under- 
standing was  totally  without  results  for  him. 
Laying  greater  stress  upon  mind,  he  extended  its 
activity  to  all  of  reality;  for  it  is  plain  that  there 
is  no  reality  without  mind.  Matter  melts  under 
his  logic  into  sensuous  experience;  back  of  which 
stands  mind.  There  is  in  all  the  history  of 
thought  no  more  brilliant  example  of  reason's 
being  led  captive  by  emotion. 

Singularly  enough  the  weapon  that  Berkeley 
used  in  his  attack  upon  Locke  is  good  English 
nominalism.  He  lays  significant  errors  at  the 


86  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS   IN    ENGLAND. 

door  of  Locke's  theory  of  abstraction,  "the 
opinion  that  the  mind  hath  a  power  of  forming 
abstract  ideas  or  notions  of  things. ' '  After  care- 
fully setting  forth  what  he  understands  by  ab- 
straction, he  declares  with  characteristic  frank- 
ness and  vigor; 

"Whether  others  have  this  wonderful  faculty  of  abstract- 
ing their  ideas,  they  best  can  tell.  For  myself,  I  find  I 
have  indeed  a  faculty  of  imagining,  or  representing  to 
myself,  the  idea  of  those  particular  things  I  have  per- 
ceived, and  of  variously  compounding  and  dividing  them. 
I  can  imagine  a  man  with  two  heads,  or  the  upper  parts 
of  a  man  joined  to  the  body  of  a  horse..  I  can  consider 
the  hand,  the  eye,  the  nose,  each  by  itself  abstracted  or 
separated  from  the  "rest  of  the  body.  But  then  whatever 
hand  or  eye  I  imagine,  it  must  have  some  particular  shape 
and  color.  Likewise  the  idea  of  a  man  that  I  frame  to 
myself,  must  be  either  a  white,  or  a  black,  or  a  tawny,  a 
straight,  or  a  crooked,  a  tall  or  a  low  or  a  middle  sized 
man.'T) 

As  for  being  able  to  have  an  abstract  idea  such 
as  humanity,  or  any  other  abstract  idea,  our 
author  absolutely  denies  his  ability  to  do  so.  Any 
image  that  he  can  call  up  in  his  imagination  is 
that  of  some  particular  man,  or  member  of  a  class. 
What  he  claims  in  regard  to  himself  he  holds  will 
be  found  true  of  most  men,  provided  they  be  not 
learned ; 

"and  there  is  ground  to  think  that  most  men  will  acknowl- 
edge themselves  to  be  in  my  case.  The  generality  of  men 
which  are  simple  and  illiterate  never  pretend  to  abstract 
notions.  *  *  *  (And  those  who  claim  this  power)  are 
confined  only  to  the  learned,"  (*) 


(')  Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge — 
Introduction,  Par.  10. 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  87 

and  citing  Locke's  case  of  the  triangle  that 

"must  be  neither  oblique  nor  rectangle,  neither  equi- 
lateral, equicrural,  nor  scalenon,  but  all  and  none  of  these 
at  once.  *  *  *  to  give  the  reader  a  yet  clearer  view 
of  the  nature  of  abstract  ideas,"  (2) 

he  declares: 

"If  any  man  has  the  faculty  of  framing  in  his  mind  such 
an  idea  of  a  triangle  as  is  here  described,  it  is  vain  to  pre- 
tend to  dispute  him  out  of  it,  nor  would  I  go  about  it.  All 
I  desire  is  that  the  reader  would  fully  and  certainly 
inform  himself  whether  he  has  such  an  idea  or  no.  And 
this,  methinks,  can  be  no  hard  task  for  anyone  to  per- 
form." (') 

It  must  be  understood  that  Berkeley  does  not 
deny  that  we  make  use  of  general  terms  but  that 
there  are  such  things  as  abstract  general  ideas,  — 
that  general  ideas  are  not  such  mental  creations 
as  Locke  would  have  us  think.  Our  use  of  such 
general  terms  can  be  easily  explained,  as  must  be 
admitted  after  the  following  citation: 

"If  we  will  annex  a  meaning  to  our  words,  and  speak 
only  of  what  we  can  conceive,  I  believe  we  shall  acknowl- 
edge that  an  idea  which,  considered  in  itself,  is  particular, 
becomes  general  by  being  made  to  represent  or  stand  for 
all  other  particular  ideas  of  the  same 


That  is  to  say,  we  think  in  examples.  At  this 
point  Berkeley  suggests  Kant;  for  his  schema,  by 
which  sense  and  reason  get  into  touch  with  each 


(«)  Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge — 

Introduction,  Par.  13. 
(*)  Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge, 

Introduction,  Par.  12. 


88  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

other,  is  a  somewhat  vague  particular  doing  duty 
as  a  universal.  But  this  comparison  would  be 
much  to  Kant's  disadvantage,  owing  to  Berkeley's 
simplicity  of  statement,  which  when  properly 
interpreted  is  very  near  to  our  present-day  ex- 
planation of  the  same. 

Continuing  his  attack  upon  abstract  ideas,  he 
declares  his  inability  to  see  the  value  of  such  ideas 
either  for  communication  or  for  the  enlargement 
of  knowledge.  Then,  too,  if  we  are  to  take  the 
words  of  Locke  seriously,  abstracting  is  no  easy 
operation  of  the  mind,  one  far  too  'difficult  for  the 
tender  ages  and  one  for  which  adults  find  but 
small  opportunity.  The  source  of  the  whole 
trouble  for  Locke,  according  to  Berkeley,  lies  in 
language;  had  there  been  no  universal  signs,  there 
would  have  been  no  thought  of  abstraction.  Be- 
cause we  have  such  signs,  Locke  would  give  us 
such  ideas,  which  for  our  author  does  not  follow; 
our  images,  or  ideas,  are  particular.  But  this 
does  not  interfere  with  the  general  accurate  use  of 
our  signs.  To  say  that  it  did  would  mean  that 
ideas  and  words  had  to  correspond,  which  is  by  no 
means  the  case ;  this  would  be  to  limit  the  useful- 
ness of  words.  Words  play  the  part  that  ideas 
may  have  once  played  in  arousing  passions  in  an- 
other; the  promise  of  good  things  calls  up  no 
image,  though  we  are  moved  by  it.  Even  proper 
names  are  not  intended  always  to  call  up  the 
image  of  the  persons  to  whom  they  refer ; 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  89 

"For  example,  when  a  schoolmen  tells  me  'Aristotle  hath 
it,'  all  I  conceive  he  means  by  it  is  to  dispose  me  to 
embrace  his  opinion  with  the  deference  and  submission 
which  custom  has  annexed  to  that  name/'C1) 

In  conclusion  our  author  declares  that  if  it  be 
correct  as  according  to  Locke  that  abstraction 
marks  man  off  from  the  brute,  then  he  himself 
must  be  so  classified ;  for  he  can  discover  in  him- 
self no  such  power  of  mind. 

So  much  space  has  been  given  to  Berkeley's  at- 
tack upon  Locke  for  good  reasons.  Aside  from  its 
intrinsic  importance  as  a  defense  of  nominalism 
from  the  psychological  viewpoint,  it  was  regarded 
by  Hume  as  one  of  the  great  contributions  to 
thought,  and  consequently  he  was  influenced  by  it 
very  much, — as  we  shall  see.  But  to  say  nothing 
of  its  place  in  Berkeley's  argument  for  the  present, 
it  deserves  particular  attention  for  another  rea- 
son. His  difference  from  Locke  at  this  point  de- 
serves more  than  a  casual  explanation ;  for  it  was 
more  than  a  mere  whim.  That  Berkeley  was  a 
good  psychologist,  few  would  deny;  his  exposition 
of  vision  and  his  general  discussion  of  the  mind 
and  its  operations,  when  separated  from  his 
metaphysics,  place  him  in  the  front  rank  of  psycho- 
logists. He,  after  Hobbes,  is  the  first  man  to 
clearly  set  forth  mind  as  the  power  of  one  experi-] 
ence  to  call  up  another.  His  ability  to  render 
these  contributions  was  due  to  the  fact  that  he 


Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge, 
Introd.,  Par.  20. 


90  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

followed  the  method  so  earnestly  urged  by  Locke. 
He  went  to  experience,  thereby  proving  himself 
a  good  Lockean  and  a  good  member  of  the  Eng- 
lish school.  And  yet,  the  results  of  their  investiga- 
tion appear  to  be  totally  different.  Berkeley  holds 
that  the  generality  of  an  idea  is  in  its  representa- 
tive relation;  Locke,  that  this  generality  is  a  con- 
struction of  the  mind.  Becent  investigation  has 
shown  that  men  are  divided  into  two  distinct 
classes ;  strong  visualizers  and  poor  ones. 

While  Berkeley  deserves  the  name  of  psycholo- 
gist, this  is  by  accident  rather  than  otherwise,  des- 
pite his  work  in  this  field  his  prime  interests  lay 
not  there.  So,  too,  his  brilliant  defense  of 
nominalism  must  not  be  regarded  as  an  effort  to 
uphold  that  doctrine  for  its  own  sake.  His  mo- 
tive lay  elsewhere.  This  attack  upon  the  theory 
of  abstraction  looked  to  his  fundamental  position 
in  metaphysics.  For  the  greatest  of  all  abstrac- 
tions is  matter;  and  with  the  overthrow  of  Locke's 
doctrine  materialism  seemed  undermined.  Hence 
Berkeley's  great  enthusiasm  for  nominalism.  We 
touch  this  merely  in  passing;  the  subject  will  later 
be  taken  up  in  its  logical  order. 

The  significance  of  Locke's  theory  of  knowledge 
is  best  got  at  through  his  doctrine  of  ideas ;  for  we 
can  kno-^r  ideas  and  their  compounds  only.  That 
ide'as  are  the  only  objects  of  our  knowledge,  Berke- 
ley readily  accepts.  And  he  proceeds  at  once  to 
substantiate  as  well  as  to  enlarge  upon  their  al- 
ready broad  meaning.  Thus,  when  I  see  an  object, 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  91 

or  in  any  way  sense  one  by  some  other  sense,  what 
I  know  is  the  idea  which  is  said  to  be  impressed  on 
the  senses;  when  I  reflect,  viewing  the  passions 
and  operations  of  the  mind,  what  I  know  here 
again,  is  ideas ;  and  when  I  call  up  in  the  imagina- 
tion any  of  the  above  formed  ideas,  what  I  know 
is  still  ideas  and  nothing  different;  for  they  all 
alike  are  perceptions  of  the  mind.  That  is  to  say, 
all  natural  phenomena,  whether  actually  per- 
ceived, remembered  or  imagined,  are  to  be  known 
as  ideas.  This  use  of  the  term  idea,  which  Berke- 
ley inherited  from  good  old  John  Locke,  helped 
him  to  melt  phenomena  and  the  world  back  of  it 
into  sensuous  experience.  The  signification  of 
the  experience  of  the  external  world  became  lost 
in  that  of  the  term  idea;  for  what  we  call  a  thing 
is  nothing  but  a  collection  of  ideas,  which  the  mind 
has  made. 

"Thus,  for  example,  a  certain  color,  taste,  smell,  figure 
and  consistence  having  been  observed  to  go  together  are 
accounted  one  distinct  thing  signified  by  the  name 
apple."  C1) 

Thus  Berkeley  clearly  points  out  that  the  mind 
creates  reality  out  of  data  gained  through  sensa- 
tion. If,  now,  there  be  such  things  as  sensations, 
i.  e.,  colors,  tastes,  etc.,  if  ideas  exist  and  are 
known,  there  must  be  some  knower,  or  perceiver. 
This  is  another  consequence  for  Berkeley,  which, 
however,  did  not  follow  for  Hume,  as  we  shall  see. 


(*)  Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge, 
Rationale  of  Principles.     Par.  1. 


92  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

"This  perceiving  active  being  is  what  I  call  MIND,  SPIRIT, 
SOUL,  or  MYSELF.  By  which  words  I  do  not  denote  any  one 
of  my  ideas,  but  a  thing  entirely  distinct  from  them, 
wherein  they  exist,  or,  which  is  the  same  thing,  whereby 
they  are  perceived, — for  the  existence  of  an  idea  consists 
in  being  perceived."  (a) 

And  this,  as  Berkeley  feels,  is  a  statement  that 
all  men  will  allow; 

"Neither  our  thoughts  nor  passions,  nor  Ideas  formed 
by  the  imagination,  exist  without  the  mind";  C1) 

for  their  very  existence  depends  on  this  relation 
to  mind,  perception.  So,  too,  for  our  author,  it 
is  just  as  evident,  and  equally  reasonable,  that 

"the  various  sensations,  or  ideas  imprinted  on  the  sense, 
however  blended  or  combined  together  (that  is,  whatever 
objects  they  compose),  cannot  exist  otherwise  than  in  the 
mind  perceiving  them.  *  *  *  For  as  to  what  is  said  of 
the  absolute  existence  of  unthinking  things  without  any 
relation  to  their  being  perceived,  that  is  to  me  perfectly 
unintelligible.  Their  esse  is  percipi/'C1) 

This  very  strikingly  precludes  Cartesian  dua- 
lism ;  for  it  would  be  contradictory  to  say  that  cer- 
tain things  exist  outside  of  my  mind,  which  my 
ideas  represent.  This,  in  the  light  of  Berkeley's 
argument,  would  be  to  declare  that  colors  cannot 
be  seen  and  that  hard  things  are  intangible. 

This  reply  to  Des  Cartes  and  Locke  and  all 
those  who  defend  the  representative  theory  of 
knowledge,  is,  it  seems,  quite  conclusive.  There- 
fore the  esse  of  the  external  world  is,  as  the  esse 
of  our  images,  merely  percipi,  and  there  is  no 


Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge, 
Rationale  of  Principles,  Pars.  2  and  3. 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  93 

substance  but  the  res  cogitans  of  Des  Cartes. 
Thus  the  ideas  that  Locke  had  thought  of  as  in- 
tervening between  the  world  of  mind  and  the 
external  world,  proved  to  be  all  there  is  of  an 
external  world.  If  ideas  are  the  objects  of  our 
knowledge,  what  use  is  there  for  another  system 
of  things  ?  Thus  we  see,  and  it  is  not  so  illogical, 
how  Berkeley  looks  upon  the  external  world,  but 
we  must  investigate  how  he  came  into  this  position 
in  more  detail. 

It  was  in  the  Lockean  distinction  between  pri- 
mary and  .secondary  qualities  that  Berkeley 
found  his  ground  already  well  prepared  for  his 
labors.  Though  this  distinction  has  become  so 
well  associated  with  the  name  of  Locke,  it  belongs 
by  equal  and  greater  right  to  Des  Cartes,  Galileo, 
and,  as  we  have  seen,  to  Hobbes,  to  say  nothing  of 
Democritus.  This  distinction  Berkeley  completely 
denies  and  that,  too,  in  a  way  that  enabled  him  to 
play  havoc  with  the  conception  of  corporeal  sub- 
stance, as  we  have  just  seen.  The  position  of 
Locke  at  this  point,  cautious  and  wavering,  did 
not  appeal  to  Berkeley,  even  though  held  by  a 
philosopher  whom  he  professed  to  greatly  admire  ^ 
nothing  could  be  cited  more  characteristic  of  either 
philosopher  than  that  of  their  position  at  this 
point.  In  fact  we  are  led  to  believe  that  Berkeley 
admires  the  position  of  the  plain  man  here  who* 
takes  as  a  matter  of  course  that  both  qualities  are 
present  in  the  external  thing,  more  than  he  does 


94  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

that  of  Locke  and  Des  Cartes.  But  so  great  is 
the  evidence,  he  would  have  us  believe,  for  the 
subjectivity  of  secondary  qualities  that  even  cau- 
tious philosophers  and  scientists  admit  them  as 
such  and  that,  too,  when  they  are  in  the  same 
moment  defending  that  inert  senseless  substance 
called  matter. 

This  is  certainly  material  at  hand  for  Berkeley. 
For,  as  he  essays  to  show,  and  that,  too,  without 
much  ado,  all  the  arguments  applicable  in  the  one 
case1  apply  with  equal  force  in  the  other  so  far  as 
subjectivity  goes.  For  him  there  is  no  half-way 
ground.  If  color  is  dependent  upon  the  perceiv- 
ing mind,  motion  and  c^i-'ntion  aro  likewise,  and 
no  less.  -For  primary  and  secondary  qualities 
alike  are  subjective;  in  either  case  esse  is  percipi. 

But  our  author  professes  an  open  mind.  For 
the  sake  of  argument,  he  grants  to  these  defend- 
ers of  corporeal  substance  that,  if  the  mind  deals 
with  these  secondary  qualities  in  a  way  that  it 
does  not  with  the  primary,  then  it  must  be  admit- 
ted that  they  have  their  case.  This  is  a  matter 
open  to  investigation.  Taking  up  one  after 
another  of  the  primary  qualities,  he  .finds  himself 
unable  to  represent  any  one  of  them  to  himself 
in  his  imagination  apart  from  concrete  experience; 
they  cannot  be  separated  or  abstracted.  Wher- 
ever he  calls  up  extension  or  motion,  there  he  finds 
that  not  only  that  it  is  some  concrete,  particular 
case  of  motion,  but  also  that  it  has  some  shape,  or 
s&i  -  . 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  95 

color,  etc.  That  is,  the  mind  treats  the  primary 
qualities  in  no  wise  differently  from  what  it  does 
the  secondary 

"In  short,  extension,  figure,  and  motion,  abstracted  from 
all  other  qualities,  are  inconceivable.  Where  therefore  the 
other  sensible  qualities  are,  there  must  these  be  also,  to 
wit,  in  the  mind  and  nowhere 


The  fault  of  these  philosophers  consists  in  the 
fact  that  they  come  to  persuade  themselves  that 
the  mind  has  this  power  of  abstracting  at  all,  an 
error  that,  as  was  pointed  out  above,  has  grown 
out  of  the  abuse  of  language  by  philosophical 
writers,  such  for  instance  as  thinking  that  ideas 
must  correspond  to  signs. 

Ideas,  then,  are  not  caused  in  our  minds  by  some 
external  object,  as  set  forth  by  Hobbes,  Democri- 
tus,  Locke  and  others.  Inert,  senseless  matter, 
even  if  there  were  such  a  substance,  which  our 
author  denies,  as  seen  above,  has  no  such  power 
over  our  ideas.  In  thus  striking  at  external  mat- 
ter, which  for  Hobbes  is  the  cause  of  ideas  and 
therefore  their  objective  coherence  upon  which  the 
law  of  association  is  ultimately  based,  Berkeley  is 
not  out  of  harmony  with  himself,  though  it  so  ap- 
pears. But  he  goes  even  further  than  this.  One 
idea  has  no  power  over  another  to  call  it  up;  for 
it  is  contrary  to  the  very  nature  of  the  idea,  by 
reason  of  its  passive  character,  that  it  should  pos- 
sess any  power  or  agency  of  this  kind: 

(l)  Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge, 
Rationale  of  Principles,  Par.  10. 


96  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

"To  be  satisfied  of  the  truth  of  this,  there  is  nothing  else 
requisite  but  a  bare  observation  of  our  ideas.  For  since 
they  and  every  part  of  them  exist  only  in  the  mind,  it  fol- 
lows that  there  is  nothing  in  them  but  what  is  per- 
ceived." (») 

This  is  true  not  only  of  our  ideas  of  the  imag- 
ination, mental  images,  but  also  of  our  ideas  of 
sense,  perceptions.  There  is  no  such  thing  as 
either  objective  or  subjective  coherence,  it  appears 
from  what  our  author  says ;  but,  he  says : 

"We  perceive  a  continual  succession  of  ideas;  some  are 
anew  excited,  others  are  changed  or  totally  disappear. 
There  is,  therefore,  some  Cause  of  these  ideas,  whereon 
they  depend,  and  which  produces  and  changes  them."(*) 

If  the  cause  of  our  ideas  and  their  coherence 
is  found  neither  in  nature  nor  in  the  ideas  them- 
selves, 

"it  remains  therefore  that  the  cause  of  ideas  is  an  incor- 
poreal active  substance  or  spirit." 

Any  human  being  as  such  an  incorporeal  mind 
has  power  to  call  up  ideas  in  his  imagination; 
such  are  the  ideas  of  reflection,  or  images.  As 
to  those  other  ideas  of  sense,  or  as  we  say,  per- 
ceptions, these  are  not  under  the  control  of  human 
minds;  their  appearance  rests  upon  the  will  of  a 
more  powerful  agent  than  ourselves,  the  Eternal 
Creator.  The  ideas  he  impresses  upon  us  are 
what  ignorant  men  call  the  external  world : 


Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge, 
Rationale  of  Principles,  Pars.  25,  26. 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  97 

"The  ideas  of  Sense  are  more  strong,  lively,  and  distinct 
than  those  of  the  Imagination;  they  have  likewise  a  stead- 
iness, order,  and  coherence,  and  are  not  excited  at  ran- 
dom, as  those  which  are  the  effects  of  human  wills  often 
are,  but  in  a  regular  train  or  series, — the  admirable  con- 
nection whereof  sufficiently  testifies  the  wisdom  and 
benevolence  of  its  Author.  Now  the  set  rules,  or  estab- 
lished methods,  wherein  the  Mind  we  depend  on  excites  in 
us  the  ideas  of  sense,  are  called  the  laws  of  nature;  and 
these  we  learn  by  experience,  which  teaches  us  that  such 
and  such  ideas  are  attended  with  such  and  such  other 
ideas,  in  the  ordinary  course  of  things."  C1) 

A  better  passage  than  the  last  given  could  not 
be  cited  to  show  that  while  Berkeley  makes  no 
conscious  use  of  the  law  of  association  of  ideas, 
as  do  Hobbes  and  Hume,  preferring  rather  to  con- 
ceal it  under  other  terms,  that  despite  this,  no  one 
more  thoroughly  understood  it.  That  is  to  say, 
he  does  what  Locke  did  in  a  way;  he  allows  his 
preconceptions  to  influence  him  in  the  selection 
of  terms.  Little  use  there  was  for  Berkeley  to 
do  this.  His  works  are  strewn  from  one  end  to 
the  other  with  evidences  that  he  consciously  or 
unconsciously  looked  upon  the  mind  in  much  the 
same  way  as  did  Hobbes  and  Hume.  If  one  would 
be  thoroughly  convinced  that  the  modern  concep- 
tion of  mind,  the  power  of  one  experience  to  call 
up  another,  is  a  fruitful  one,  then  let  him  go  read 
Berkeley's  Essay  on  Vision. 

The  power  of  the  human  mind  to  call  up  ideas 
in  the  imagination  is  called  the  will;  whereas  the 
power  of  the  mind  to  perceive  the  impressed  ideas 


(*)  Treatise  Concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge, 
Rationale  of  Principles,  Par.  30. 


98  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

of  sense  as  well  as  those  that  have  called  up  in 
the  imagination  is  denominated  the  understand- 
ing. It  is  through  the  avenue  of  the  will  that  the 
mind  really  manifests  its  activity.  Those  who 
question  the  power  of  the  will  to  control  ideas 
need  only  carefully  observe  the  operation  of  their 
own  mind  for  confirmation  of  the  doctrine.  To 
speak  of  unthinking  agents  exciting  these  ideas 
exclusive  of  volition  is  contrary  to  reason,  accord- 
ing to  our  author.  Thus  it  would  seem  that  these 
great  faculties  of  the  mind  are  powers  indeed, 

"  not  mere  names  for  the  behavior  of  images  in  our 
minds, — they  are  the  real  powers  of  an  active  soul 
substance. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  while  our  author  over- 
throws the  representative  theory  of  knowledge, 
showing  to  his  complete  satisfaction  that  in  know- 
ing our  ideas  we  are  knowing  all  the  objects  of 
knowledge,  since  there  are  no  external  things  with 
which  our  ideas  may  or  may  not  agree,  he  never- 
theless keeps  the  distinction  between  the  world 
of  sensuous  experience  and  that  of  the  imagina- 
tion, realizing  the  value  of  such  a  distinction.  He 
does  not  make  clear,  however,  one  point  that 
Hume  makes  something  of  later,  that  is,  whether 
the  mind  can  of  its  own  volition  create  new  ideas, 

-  other  than  the  ones  that  it  has  had  in  experience. 
His  attack  upon  abstraction  is,  it  seems,  apart 
from  this  point ;  it  is  the  accident  rather  than  the 
essence  that  our  ideas  must  have  the  concrete 
look,  that  is  so  far  as  our  having  to  have  them 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  99 

first  as  impression  goes.  To  be  clear,  owing  to 
the  closeness  of  all  objects  of  knowledge  the  ques- 
tion of  the  priority  of  sense  to  reflection  loses  its 
real  significance.  And  yet,  owing  to  the  fact  that 
Berkeley  consistently  maintained  a  distinction  be- 
tween our  ideas  of  sense  and  those  of  reflection, 
he  should  not  be  called  a  subjectivist. 

Whatever  may  be  said  of  this  one  aspect  of  the 
subject,  Berkeley  certainly  makes  it  clear  that  so 
far  as  our  understanding  goes  when  we  conceive 
ideas  we  do  the  same  thing  that  we  do  when  we 
perceive.  Perception  and  conception  are  of  the 
same  nature,  the  only  difference  being  that  in  the 
one  case  a  more  powerful  will  than  that  of  the 
individual  brings  up  ideas  for  his  perception  with 
a  vividness  that  corresponds  to  its  greater  power ; 
while  on  the  other  hand  the  individual  will  calls 
up  the  idea  of  its  own  motion.  But  in  either  case 
the  mind  must  be  active  in  perception  or  there  are 
no  ideas. 

The  doctrine  of  Berkeley  again  suggests  Kant; 
for  is  not  this  the  task  that  he  really  set  himself 
to?  an  explanation  of  the  close  relationship  that 
exists  between  .perception  and  conception.  There 
are  those,  who  while  they  by  no  means  subscribe 
to  the  Berkleyan  doctrine  are  prone  to  admire 
these  straightforward,  consistent  explanations  of 
Irish  wit  more  than  they  feel  disposed  to  ex- 
tend the  Copernican  revolution  in  thought.  The 
priority  of  sensation  has  small  significance  for 
Berkeley;  ideas  of  imagination  need  not  be  the 


100  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

copies  of  those  of  sense ;  they  are  not  causally  re- 
lated, but  both  exist  merely  in  as  far  as  they  are 
perceived.  This  is  not  very  different  from  what 
Kant  tried  to  do.  He  held  that  the  phenomena 
that  we  have  in  perception  are  the  unconscious 
creation  of  the  imagination's  activity  just  as  our 
conceptions  are  its  conscious  creation.  The  fact 
that  our  sensations  and  perceptions  have  to  be 
subjected  to  unification  under  the  forms  space  and 
time  is  not  to  the  point,  as  this  has  to  do  merely 
with  the  machinery  of  Kant's  psychology.  The 
point  here  made  is  that  Kant  and  Berkeley  each 
tried  to  do  the  same  thing, — get  in  behind  mech- 
anism; that  the  statement  of  Berkeley  is  valu- 
able at  least  for  its  simplicity. 

There  is  much  in  the  philosophy  of  Berkeley 
that  suggests  the  general  position  of  Hobbes.  For 
both  the  fundamental  nature  of  images  in  our 
mind  and  perceptions  of  the  external  world  is  the 
same.  In  Hobbes  images  of  the  mind  as  well  as 
phantasms  of  sense  are  dependent  upon  motion  of 
the  internal  parts  of  the  body ;  in  the  one  case  the 
stimuli  are  present,  in  the  other  case,  removed; 
while  for  Berkeley  ideas  of  sense  no  less  than 
ideas  of  the  imagination  are  dependent  absolutely 
upon  the  activity  of  mind;  in  the  one  case  the 
mind  is  that  of  God  and  in  the  other  that  of  the  in- 
dividual mind  to  whom  it  is  given  to  have  ideas. 
The  external  world,  which  is  a  vast  system  of 
motion  for  Hobbes,  is  for  Berkeley  the  unlimited 
field  of  the  operation  of  the  mind  of  God.  This 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  101 

fundamental  likeness,  concealed  only  in  terms,  is 
not  without  reasonable  explanation.  This  is  to  be 
found  in  their  introspective  experimental  investi- 
gation. 

Considering  this  likeness  in  psychology, :  i\ :  is 
not  surprising  that  while  the  one  extended'  the  ' 
domain  of  sense  over  that  of  the  imagii^von^ttyi'  • 
imagination  being  merely  decaying  sense,  that  the 
other  should  extend  the  domain  of  mind  over  that 
of  sense;  for  the  operation  of  calling  up  an  idea 
in  the  mind  and  experiencing  a  percept  of  an  ex-  : 
ternal  thing  differs  only  in  that  one  is  a  voluntary 
while  the  other  is  an  involuntary  experience.    It 
is  true  that  one  is  a  more  vivid  idea  than  the  other, 
but  they  are  nevertheless  of  the  same  nature  fund- 
amentally.     The  one  no  less  than  the  other  is  a 
perception  of  an  idea  by  the  mind  and  nothing 
more. 

Too  much  cannot  be  made  of  this  similarity 
between  the  most  uniformly  and  consistently  , 
spiritual  philosopher  and  the  most  consistent  and 
uniform  defender  of  materialism.  It  goes  far  to- 
wards marking  the  fundamental  likeness  that  un- 
derlies all  interpretations  of  the  universe  when  we 
have  robbed  ourselves  of  anthropoinorhphic  con- 
ceptions and  sensuous  verbiage  only  to  come  into 
the  possession  of  the  richer  heritage  of  the  more 
exact  terms  of  a  scientific  terminology.  So,  too, 
nothing  could  better  illustrate  the  significance  of 
terms  in  the  history  of  thought. 


102  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

It  is  well  to  bear  constantly  in  mind  this  funda- 
mental similarity,  but  when  we  turn  to  their  doc- 
trines, the  case  is  quite  different.  The  most  strik- 
ing 'difference  is  then  present  in  the  Berkeleyan 
use  of  the  conception  of  will,  the  essential 
faculty  of  mind.  As  we  have  seen,  mind  in  the 
system  of  Berkeley  replaces  motion  in  the  system 
of  Hobbes.  How  different  the  content  of  these  two 
terms!  There  is  the  great  Mind  of  the  universe, 
whence  the  order  and  continuity  of  nature ;  there 
is  the  individual  mind,  whence  our  ability  to  call 
up  our  ideas  in  the  imagination  and  to  think  con- 
nectedly. Thus  the  order  of  the  universe  and 
mental  control  flow  from  Berkeley's  unanalysed 
conception  of  mind.  In  Hobbes '  system  of  motion, 
if  we  take  it  with  its  implicit  consequences,  the 
human  mind  is  but  an  insignificant  corner  into 
which  can  come  mere  eddies  of  this  universal 
motion.  What  motions  come  into  this  mind  de- 
pend upon  its  location  in  the  universe,  and  it  must 
continue  to  repeat  these  motions  until  new  motions 
break  in  from  without  to  counteract  them.  It 
possesses  no  original  activity,  but  is  the  product 
of  experience.  How  different  all  this  is  from 
Berkeley's  soul  that  can  make  and  unmake  ideas 
of  its  own  volition,  thereby  displaying  a  freedom 
and  spontaneity  almost  inconceivable.  For  such 
a  soul  while  dependent  upon  universal  mind  is 
none  the  less  separate,  independent  and  distinct, 
this  individuality  being  of  its  very  essence. 


BERKELEY:    DOGMATIC    SPIRITUALISM.  103 

The  question  at  issue  here  is  a  most  fundamental 
one, — is  the  term  will  a  fruitful  concept?  Hobbes, 
taking  the  present-day  position,  dismisses  the 
term  will  as  unfruitful,  while  Berkeley  regards  it 
as  unanalysable  and  hence  fundamental.  For  will 
is  just  this  originative,  active  essence  of  mind  back 
of  which  we  cannot  go.  On  this  fundamental  and 
unanalysable  character  of  the  term  will  is  staked 
Berkeley's  whole  case.  Mind  cannot  be  explained 
in  terms  of  other  things ;  we  have  not  the  concept 
capable  of  meeting  the  situation.  But,  according 
to  Berkeley,  all  other  things  can  be  explained  in 
terms  of  mind.  Whence  his  psychological  inter- 
pretation of  the  universe. 

But  both  philosophers  are  inconsistent.  Hob- 
bes,  as  we  have  seen,  made  use  of  what  Berkeley 
chooses  to  cover  in  the  term  will  when  he  in- 
troduced arbitrary  signs  and  the  law  of  interest, 
thereby  cutting  his  mind  off  from  the  universe  of 
which  it  was  a  part.  While  Berkeley  was  also  in- 
consistent, when  after  setting  forth  so  clearly  the 
true  nature  of  mind  as  the  power  of  one  experience 
to  call  up  another,  and  emphasizing  the  part  that 
custom  and  habit  play  in  its  building  up, — when  in 
direct  opposition  to  all  the  genuine  contributions 
that  he  had  made  to  the  science  of  psychology  he 
chose  to  rest  his  case  upon  the  unanalysed  concep- 
tion of  will. 


IV. 
HUME:    CRITICAL   POSITIVISM. 


IV. 
HUME:  CRITICAL  POSITIVISM. 

Locke  had  said  that  the  mind  gets  its  idea  of 
power  from  an  observation  of  the  will;  Berkeleyr 
following  in  his  wake,  had  taken  the  same  popular, 
unanalyzed  conception  of  power  and  through  it 
had  explained  the  behavior  of  not  only  mind  but 
also  of  the  universe.  The  investigations  of  Hume 
fail  to  uphold  Berkeley's  psychological  interpre- 
tation of  the  universe;  nothing,  he  argues,  is  to 
be  gained  by  proceeding  upon  unanalyzed  concep- 
tions. We  must,  to  have  a  true  science,  go  back 
to  the  original  impressions  upon  the  mind.  In 
terms  of  these  impressions  alone  are  we  to  know 
in  the  scientific  sense.  Our  author  is  thoroughly 
convinced  that  if  we  employ  this  method,  which  is 
the  same  as  that  employed  in  the  natural  sciences, 
the  results  will  be  far  from  fruitless.  In  this  con- 
nection he  says: 

"For  to  me  it  seems  evident,  that  the  essence  of  the  mind 
being  equally  unknown  to  us  with  that  of  external  bodies, 
it  must  be  equally  impossible  to  form  any  notion  of  its 
powers  and  qualities  otherwise  than  from  careful  and 
exact  experiments,  and  the  observation  of  those  particular 
effects,  which  result  from  its  different  circumstances  and 
situations  *  *  *  and  any  hypothesis  that  pretends  to 
discover  the  ultimate  original  qualities  of  human  nature, 
ought  at  first  to  be  rejected  as  presumptuous  and  chimer- 
ical.'T) 


(*)  A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Introd.,  page  XXI. 


108  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

Proper  acquaintance  with  the  extent  and  force 
of  the  human  understanding  means  much  to  the 
race. 

"  Tis  impossible  to  tell  what  changes  and  improvements 
we  might  make  in  these  sciences  (mathematics,  natural 
philosophy  and  natural  religion,  i.  e.,  through  the  study  of 
man)  were  we  thoroughly  acquainted  with  the  extent  and 
force  of  the  human  understanding,  and  could  we  explain 
the  nature  of  the  ideas  we  employ,  and  of  the  operations 
we  perform  in  our  reasonings."  (*) 

In  this  our  author  may  have  been  under  the  influ- 
ence of  Hobbes  who  saw  fit  in  his  study  of  the  state 
to  prefix  a  study  of  man  in  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
he  had  not  a  little  to  say  about  mental  phenomena 
and  their  relation  to  morality.  But  it  must  be  said 
that  the  contributions  of  Hume  to  this  subject  are 
such  that  his  independence  should  be  recognized  by 
•i.ll.  Hume  does  not  come  at  the  subject  with  Hob- 
bistic  dogmatism;  for  the  atmosphere  of  thought 
in  his  day  was  far  different  from  what  it  was  in 
the  day  of  Hobbes.  But  be  it  to  his  credit  that  he 
had  faith ;  for,  if  experiments  that  were  made  with 
care  were  judiciously  collected  and  compared,  he 
saw  no  reason  why  a  science  might  not  be  built  up 
that  would 

"not  be  inferior  in  certainty,  and  much  superior  in  utility 
to  any  other  of  human  comprehension." (]) 

With  such  faith  in  the  possibility  of  such  a  sci- 
ence, which  certainly  contrasts  well  with  Comte, 


Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Introduction,  pp.  XIX  and 
XXIII. 


HUME:   CRITICAL  POSITIVISM.  109 

Hume  himself  goes  to  work  in  serious  earnest  to 
investigate  mental  phenomena.  It  is  the  results 
of  this  investigation  that  we  now  have  under  con- 
sideration. The  method  employed  by  Hume  is 
that  of  the  individualistic  introspective  psychol- 
ogy. There  was  a  tentative  acceptance  of  the  Car- 
tesian two-world  theory.  While  his  steps  in  part 
retrace  those  of  his  predecessors,  they  possess  suf- 
ficient uniqueness  and  originality  to  demand  full 
treatment.  The  perspicuous  manner  with  which 
he  details  the  results  of  his  own  investigation ;  the 
success  with  which  he  sums  up  and  brings  to  ac- 
count the  work  of  his  predecessors,  is  reason 
enough  for  setting  forth  in  some  detail  even  at  the 
expense  of  repetition,  what  he  has  to  say. 

"All  perceptions  of  the  human  mind  resolve  themselves 
into  two  distinct  kinds,  which  I  shall  call  impressions 
and  ideas"; 

the  former  are  those  perceptions  that  strike  upon 
the  mind  with  most  force  and  violence  in  entering 
consciousness;  under  which  are  included  also  all 
sensations,  passions  and  emotions  as  they  make 
their  first  appearance  in  the  soul.  By  ideas  are 
understood  faint  images,  or  copies,  of  the  impres- 
sions, that  are  found  in  our  thinking  and  reason- 
ing. There  is  no  ground  for  confusion ;  for  broad- 
ly speaking,  the  distinction  is  that  commonly  made 
between  feeling  and  thinking. 

'Tho'  it  is  not  impossible  but  in  particular  instances 
they  may  very  nearly  approach  to  each  other.  Thus  In 


(')  A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature.  Bk.  1,  Sec.  I,  page  1. 


110  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

sleep,  in  a  fever,  in  madness,  or  in  any  very  violent  emo- 
tions of  the  soul,  our  ideas  may  approach  to  our  impres- 
sions: as  on  the  other  hand  it  sometimes  happens,  that 
our  impressions  are  so  faint  and  low,  that  we  cannot  dis- 
tinguish them  from  our  ideas."  C1) 

In  this  use  of  the  term  idea,  Hume  feels  that  he 
is  restoring  the  term  to  its  proper  signification: 
while  the  term  impression  has  been  introduced  to 
supply  a  real  need,  there  being  no  word  in  the  lan- 
guage used  with  just  the  meaning  here  given  it. 
Ideas,  then,  are  for  Hume  not  what  they  are  for 
Berkeley  or  even  Locke;  their  meaning  for  this 
term  was  entirely  too  broad.  On  the  contrary 
they  are  mental  images,  or  what  Berkeley  calls 
ideas  of  the  imagination,  and  Hobbes,  imagina- 
tions, or  fancies;  in  all  cases  the  term  is  opposed 
to  phantasms  of  sense. 

Perceptions  are  again  divided  into  two  classes : 
Simple  and  Complex;  the  same  distinction  is  car- 
ried out  consequently  in  ideas  and  impressions. 
Simple  perceptions  admit  of  no  distinction  or  sep- 
aration ;  while  on  the  other  hand  complex  ones  may 
be  distinguished  into  parts,  as  in  the  case  of  an 
apple,  which  may  be  distinguished  into  color,  taste 
and  smell. 

On  first  examination,  it  appears  that  our  ideas 
are  exact  copies  of  our  impressions ;  for  they  ap- 
pear to  always  correspond,  the  only  difference  be- 
ing the  force  and  vivacity  of  the  one  as  opposed 
to  the  faintness  of  the  other.  But  on  further  ex- 

(i)  ^  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Bk.  1,  Sec.  I,  p.  2. 


HUME:  CRITICAL  POSITIVISM.  Ill 

amination,  it  may  be  seen  that  this  is  not  the  case ; 
for  it  will  be  found  that  one  may  imagine  things 
that  he  has  not  seen  and,  on  the  other  hand,  see 
things  that  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  conceive  im- 
ages of  in  the  mind.  For  example,  what  is  more 
easy  than  for  one  to  bring  up  in  his  imagination 
an  image  of  the  New  Jerusalem,  whose  pavements 
are  of  gold,  whose  walls  are  of  rubies ;  on  the  other 
hand,  having  seen  Paris,  it  is  impossible  to  call  up 
an  image  of  that  city  that  in  any  wise  does  it  jus- 
tice. It  appears,  then,  that  in  the  case  of  complex 
ideas,  strictly  speaking,  one  could  hardly  say  that 
they  are  copies  of  their  impressions. 

But  this  is  not  the  case  with  our  simple  impres- 
sions ;  in  regard  to  these  our  author  has  this  to 
say: 

"That  the  rule  holds  here  without  any  exception,  and 
that  every  simple  idea  has  a  simple  impression,  which  re- 
sembles it;  and  every  simple  impression  a  correspondent 
idea.  That  the  idea  of  red,  which  we  form  in  the  dark, 
and  that  impression,  which  strikes  our  eyes  in  the  sun- 
shine, differ  only  in  degree,  not  in  nature."  (*) 

By  way  of  convincing  those  who  doubt  the  truth 
of  this  conclusion,  our  author  challenges  anyone 
to  point  to  a  single  simple  impression  that  has  not 
its  corresponding  simple  idea. 

This  constant  conjunction  does  not  arise  from 
chance ;  either  our  ideas  are  caused  by  our  impres- 
sions or  our  impressions  are  caused  by  our  ideas. 
It  is  discovered  that  our  impressions  make  their 


(*)  A  Treatise  on  Human  Nature,  Bk.  I,  Sec.  I,  page  3. 


112  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

appearance  first ;  this  fact  added  to  an  equally  sig- 
nificant one,  that  the  loss  of  some  faculty,  as  that 
of  sight,  marks  not  only  the  loss  of  impressions 
but  also  of  ideas  that  correspond  to  those  impres- 
sions, leaves  our  author  to  conclude  that  our  im- 
pressions are  the  causes  of  our  ideas,  not  our  ideas 
of  our  impressions.  This  is  a  matter  beyond  ques- 
tion. The  fact  that  it  may  be  possible,  indeed 
doubtless  is,  for  one  by  bare  power  of  the  imagina- 
tion to  supply  a  deficiency  in  the  nature  of  one 
member  of  a  series  of  shades  of  colors,  for  in- 
stance, is  not  held  to  invalidate  the  above  law.  It 
is  also  true  that  there  are  such  things  as  secondary 
ideas,  still  fainter  images  of  these  faint  copies  of 
the  impressions ;  this  again  is  held  to  mark  no  ex- 
ception to  the  above  law,  as  to  which  there  can 
hardly  be  a  question. 

Impressions  are  of  two  kinds :  those  of  sensation 
and  those  of  reflection.  The  former  arise  in  the 
soul  from  unknown  causes  (for  our  author  does 
not  make  the  gratuitous  assumptions  of  Des 
Cartes,  Hobbes,  Berkeley  and  the  plain  man), 
while  the  latter  are  derived  for  the  most  part 
from  our  ideas.  As  impressions  are  prior  to  our 
ideas,  so  impressions  from  unknown  causes  are 
prior  to  those  of  reflection.  The  study  of  these 
impressions  that  arise  from  unknown  causes  are 
not  within  the  task  of  the  moral  philosopher,  such 
as  Hume  regarded  himself.  This  is  rather  the 
province  of  the  anatomist  and  natural  scientist. 


HUME:   CRITICAL,  POSITIVISM.  113 

Hence  our  author  turns  his  attention  to  the  im- 
pressions of  reflection  and  to  ideas. 

When  an  impression  from  some  unknown  cause 
is  made  in  the  mind,  its  copy  is  taken ;  this  is  what 
is  called  an  idea,  or  as  we  might  say  to-day,  an 
image.  This  idea,  or  mental  image,  arising  in  the 
mind,  may  itself  create  an  impression  through 
some  passion ;  this  impression,  again,  is  copied  by 
the  mind  and  there  exists  a  new  idea,  or  image,  in 
the  mind.  This  last  idea  may  itself,  so  far  as  we 
know,  arise  in  the  mind  creating  a  new  impression 
with  its  corresponding  idea,  and  so  on  indefinitely. 
Such  impressions  as  are  thus  gotton  from  ideas  in 
the  mind  are  what  are  called  impressions  of  reflec- 
tion. Thus,  for  example,  if  one  experiences  the 
sensation  of  cold,  his  mind  from  this  impression 
which  is  created  by  an  unknown  cause  forms  an 
idea  of  cold.  This  idea  of  cold  may  again  rise  in 
the  mind,  creating  new  impressions  of  desire  or 
pain.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  our  author  feels 
that  control  of  the  passions  is  intimately  allied 
with  that  of  ideas.  For  this  reason,  again,  he 
turns  his  attention  to  ideas,  the  proper  knowledge 
of  the  behavior  of  which  he  thinks  will  greatly 
simplify  the  problems  of  our  passions  and 
emotions. 

There  are  two  faculties  by  which  we  repeat  our 
ideas:  memory  and  imagination.  Ideas  repeated 
by  the  former  are  more  of  the  character  of  impres- 
sions than  those  of  the  imagination,  i.  e.  the  former 


114  IDEALISTIC   BEGINNINGS   IN  ENGLAND. 

.are  more  strong,  painted  in  much  more  vivid 
colors,  and  what  is  a  more  important  distinction, 
tied  down  to  a  strict  reproduction  of  impressions 
without  variation ;  while  those  of  the  imagination, 
on  the  other  hand,  are  less  distinct  and  more  un- 
-steady,  but  not  bound  down  to  the  same  order  and 
form  of  original  impressions.  Both  classes  of 
ideas  are  dependent  upon  impressions;  but  while 
this  is  true  the  liberty  of  the  imagination  in  trans- 
posing and  changing  its  ideas  is  very  great, — far 
more  so,  Hume  would  have  us  believe,  than  we  are 
ordinarily  aware.  Whence  fiery  dragons,  winged 
horses,  etc.  For  the  imagination  plays  to  the  ex- 
treme in  separating  complex  ideas  and  in  uniting 
simple  ones,  as  is  evident  from  such  an  idea  as  that 
of  a  winged  horse.  But  to  the  activity  of  the  im- 
.agination  belong  not  merely  such  harmless  mental 
creations  as  those  of  the  kind  just  noticed,  but,  it 
may  be,  such  principles  as  that  of  causality. 

The  many  roles  that  the  term,  imagination,  has 
played  in  philosophy  is  noticed  by  Hume  himself, 
who  in  a  note  apologizes  for  his  own  lax  use  of  it, 
which  he  says  is  anything  but  philosophic,  thus : 

"By  this  expression  it  appears  that  the  word,  imagina- 
tion, is  commonly  us'd  in  two  different  senses;  and  tho' 
nothing  be  more  contrary  to  true  philosophy,  than  this  in- 
accuracy, yet  in  the  following  reasonings  I  have  often 
been  oblig'd  to  fall  into  it.  When  I  oppose  the  imagina- 
tion to  the  memory,  I  mean  the  faculty,  by  which  we  form 
our  fainter  ideas.  When  I  oppose  it  to  reason,  I  mean  the 
same  faculty,  excluding  only  our  demonstrative  and  prob- 
able reasonings",  (*) 


(>)  A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Bk.  I,  Sec.  IX,  note  p.  117. 


HUME:   CRITICAL  POSITIVISM.  115 

while  otherwise  we  are  left  to  understand  that  the 
context  alone  will  be  sufficient  to  explain  its  mean- 
ing. This  note  by  itself  might  easily  be  mislead- 
ing; for  the  imagination  is  a  far  more  funda- 
mental term  in  the  writings  of  Hume  than  these 
words  lead  us  to  believe.  We  have  hinted  that  it 
is  this  faculty  that  may  lead  us  to  believe  in  such 
a  principle  as  that  of  causality  and,  as  we  shall 
see  later,  the  order  of  the  external  world,  or  in  the 
words  of  Hume. 

"A  much  greater  regularity  among  objects  than  what 
they  have  when  we  look  no  further  than  our  senses." 

If  we  look  a  little  more  deeply  into  his  use  of 
this  term,  we  shall  see  that  his  use  of  it  is  just 
about  what  Hobbes'  use  of  it  was.  The  imagina- 
tion is  the  most  fundamental  term  in  mental 
phenomena  for  both.  Let  us  see.  All  images,  or 
ideas,  are  caused  by  impressions;  when  we  call 
them  up  as  they  were  experienced  in  impressions, 
we  call  this  memory;  when  we  call  them  up  free 
from  these  chains,  we  call  this  imagination.  But 
the  fundamental  nature  is  the  same,  just  as  it  was 
in  the  case  of  Hobbes,  recall  of  images  in  consci- 
ousness. So,  too,  our  author  may  speak  of  reason, 
the  understanding  and  other  faculties  of  the  mind, 
but  this  must  not  lead  us  to  believe  that  he  is  an 
advocate  of  the  faculty  psychology  because  he 
makes  use  of  its  jargon,  as  indeed  we  all  do ;  for 
these  are  all  mere  names  for  the  one  fundamental 
thing,  the  imagination,  viewed  from  different 


116  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

aspects.  And  yet  we  are  told  that  the  imagination 
is  not  as  significant  as  the  understanding,  which 
none  the  less  quite  contradictorily  is  simply 

"the  general  and  more  established  properties  of  the  imag- 
ination." C1) 

which  quotation  it  appears  is  in  itself  sufficient 
witness  to  our  author's  Hobbistic  use  of  the  term 
imagination. 

"Were    ideas    entirely    loose    and    unconnected,    chance 
alone  wou'd  join  them";(2) 

but  this  is  not  the  case.  Ideas  of  memory  must  of 
course  reappear  in  the  mind  as  they  have  been  ex- 
perienced as  impressions,  but  particular  reference 
is  had  now  to  ideas  of  imagination.  Manifestly  to 
place  them  under  the  same  law  as  those  of  memory 
would  be  simply  to  transpose  them  to  that  class, 
and  the  distinction  made  between  our  ideas  at  the 
outset  would  be  a  useless  one.  Ideas  of  the  im- 
agination are  free  and  at  the  beck  and  call  of  the 
imagination,  but  they  are  subject  to  the  limitations 
set  above,  i.  e.  no  ideas  are  joined  by  chance.  This 
must  mean  that  when  our  author  makes  them  sub- 
ject to  the  beck  and  call  of  the  imagination  he 
means  that  they  are  appearing  according  to  some 
law  of  the  mind  that  must  be  discovered.  And 


D  A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Bk.  1,  Part  IV,  Sec.  VII,  p. 

267. 
(2)  A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Bk  1,  Sec.  IV,  p.  10. 


HUME:  CRITICAL  POSITIVISM.  117 

here  we  shall  see  that  he  goes  back  to  Hobbes  via 
Berkeley  and  Locke.    He  says : 

(There  is  a)  "uniting  principle  among  our  ideas  (which) 
is  not  to  be  considered  as  an  inseparable  connexion;  for 
that  has  been  already  excluded  from  the  imagination;  nor 
yet  are  we  to  conclude,  that  without  it  the  mind  cannot 
join  two  ideas;  for  nothing  is  more  free  than  that  faculty; 
but  we  are  only  to  regard  it  as  a  gentle  force,  which  com- 
monly prevails."  (*) 

This  use  of  "gentle  force "  looks  very  much  as  if 
Hume  were  going  to  give  us  a  causal  law  between 
ideas  that  he  is  later  to  deny  us  in  the  case  of 
bodies.  But  we  shall  have  to  place  the  emphasis 
here  upon  the  "gentle" ;  for  this  statement  is  soon 
completely  swallowed  up  in  his  definite  statement 
of  the  law  of  association.  For  back  of  this  union 
of  ideas  stands  nature ;  our  experience  in  the  way 
of  education,  habit,  custom,  as  well  as  reality 
direct,  is  the  basis  of  mental  association.  Nature 
tells  what  simple  ideas  are  most  proper  to  be 
united  into  complex  ones,  but  the  union  of  these 
ideas  is  the  work  of  the  imagination. 

There  are  three  great  qualities  by  which  the 
mind  passes  from  one  idea  to  another,  to  wit :  Re- 
semblance, Contiguity  in  time  or  space,  and  Cause 
and  Effect,  out  of  which  qualities  comes  the  law 
of  association.  The  imagination  runs  easily  from 
one  idea  to  another  that  resembles  it;  this  is  a 
matter  of  too  common  observation  to  demand 
proof  from  our  author.  As  the  senses  are  con- 
stantly forced  to  pass  from  one  object  to  another 


A  Treatise  on  Human  Nature,  Bk.  1,  Sec.  4,  page  10. 


118  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

that  are  contiguous  in  time  or  space;  so  the  im- 
agination by  long  habit  comes  to  acquire  the  same 
method  in  thinking, — indeed,  the  best  that  can  be 
said  of  these  relations  so  far  as  our  author  can 

•  see,  is  that  they  are  habits  of  mind.  The  most  im- 
portant of  which  is  that  of  cause  and  effect;  of 
which  later. 

A  comparison  with  Hobbes  at  this  point  is  not 
without  interest.  Hobbes  accepts  the  law,  though 
he  does  not  state  it  so  clearly,  more  completely 

-,  than  Hume ;  for  Hume  will  not  admit  that  this  is 
the  only  way  of  mind.  The  imagination  uses  this 
method,  as  is  evident,  but  who  knows  what  else 
it  may  have  at  its  disposal.  He  seems  to  be  afraid 
that  to  go  further  would  commit  him  to  some  pre- 
supposition such  as  Cartesian  dualism,  as  in 
Locke;  or  materialism,  as  in  Hobbes;  or  spirit- 
ualism, as  in  Berkeley.  Which,  of  course,  has  its 
very  commendable  aspect. 

The  position  here  taken  by  Hume  had  important 
bearings;  its  relevancy  in  the  matter  of  abstract 
ideas,  for  instance,  is  much  better  understood 
than  it  was  in  the  case  of  Berkeley.  Here  we  find 
Hume  in  complete  agreement  with  Berkeley.  Ho 
says  that  he  considers  the  contribution  of  the 
Bishop  in  this  respect  the  greatest  and  most  val- 
uable discovery  that  has  been  made  "of  late 
years  in  the  republic  of  letter s."  He  would,  there- 
fore, endeavor  merely  to  confirm  it  by  some  argu- 
ments that  will,  he  hopes,  put  it  beyond  all  doubt 
and  controversy.  He  holds  that  it  is  utterly  im- 


HUME:   CRITICAL  POSITIVISM. 

possible  to  form  the  idea  of  quantity  or  quality 
without  forming  a  definite  and  concrete  idea  of 
it ;  to  do  otherwise  would  be  both  to  have  and  not 
have  an  idea  at  one  and  the  same  time,  since  to 
have  an  idea  is  to  have  an  idea  of  some  object. 
The  image,  then,  that  the  mind  brings  up  is  a  con- 
crete particular  image,  but  the  mind  not  only 
brings  up  such  an  image  at  such  a  time  when 
some  word  is  mentioned,  or  the  image  in  some  way 
called  up, — it  does  a  great  deal  more ;  it  calls  ur> 
a  certain  custom  and  habit  that  has  gone  with 
images  of  this  character.  So  that  when  the  mind 
calls  up  one  concrete  image,  it  has  all  other  kin- 
dred concrete  images  in  the  antechamber  of  con- 
sciousness ready  to  be  summoned  when  needed. 
Thus,  if  some  one  having  in  his  mind  the  image 
of  an  equilateral  triangle,  should  say  that  the 
angles  of  a  triangle  are  equal,  immediately  in  the 
mind  of  the  listening  mathematician  there  would 
arise  the  images  of  those  triangles  of  which  this 
statement  would  not  hold  true.  The  ability  to 
deny  the  truth  of  such  a  general  statement  would 
rest  not  as  with  Kant  upon  pure  intuition  by 
means  of  the  forms  of  space,  but  simply  upon  the 
experience  of  the  mathematician;  for  it  is  not 
likely  that  any  but  one  who  has  had  such  expe- 
rience would  be  able  to  controvert  the  general 
proposition. 

Complex  ideas  formed  by  the  association  of 
ideas  are  divided  into  three  classes :  Relations, 
Modes  and  Substances.  Relations  are  those  qual- 


120  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

ities  that  make  an  object  admit  of  comparison; 
impressions  such  as  these  are  prior  to  our  ideas 
of  relations.  A  quality  by  which  two  ideas  are  con- 
nected in  the  imagination,  or  that  particular  cir- 
cumstance in  which  we  think  proper  to  compare 
two  ideas  in  the  fancy,  may  be  said  to  be  a  rela- 
tion. These  may  be  comprised  under  seven 
general  heads  which  are  the  sources  of  all  philo- 
sophical relation.  They  are  resemblance,  identity, 
space  and  time,  quantity,  quality,  contrariety,  and 
cause  and  effect;  difference  being  really  a  nega- 
tion of  any  relation,  is  for  that  reason  excluded 
from  this  list. 

The  idea  of  substance  is  one  of  peculiar  in- 
terest. On  investigation  our  author  finds  that  it 
cannot  be  derived  either  from  impressions  of 
sense  or  from  those  of  reflection.  For  on  the  one 
hand  it  would  have  to  be  a  sound,  or  a  taste,  or  an 
odor ;  while  on  the  other  hand  it  would  have  to  be 
an  emotion.  Neither  of  which  seems  to  be  the 
case ;  so  our  author  concludes : 

"We  have  therefore  no  idea  of  substance,  distinct  from 
that  of  a  collection  of  particular  qualities."  C1) 

What  is  said  here  of  substance  applies  also  to 
modes. 

"The  idea  of  substance  as  well  as  that  of  a  mode,  is 
nothing  but  a  collection  of  simple  ideas,  that  are  united  "by 
the  imagination,  and  have  a  particular  name  assigned 
them,  by  which  we  are  able  to  recall  either  to  ourselves 
or  others,  that  collection. "(*) 


'(*)  A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Bk.  1,  Sec.  6,  page  16. 


HUME:  CRITICAL  POSITIVISM.  121 

The  difference  between  the  ideas  of  substance 
and  that  of  a  mode  is  this:  in  the  one  case  the 
qualities  that  form  a  substance  are  referred  to 
an  unknown  something  in  which  they  are  sup- 
posed to  inhere;  or  to  put  the  matter  otherwise, 
we  may  say  that  these  qualities  are  supposed  to 
be  inseparably  connected  in  relations  of  contig- 
uity and  causation, — association,  in  short.  While 
on  the  other  hand,  this  is  not  true  in  the  case  of 
the  idea  of  a  mode.  From  which  it  follows  that, 
if  on  observation  it  can  be  found  that  another 
quality  can  be  brought  under  the  same  relation 
to  the  same  substance  that  other  qualities  sustain 
to  the  substance  in  question,  this  quality  must 
then  be  added  to  the  substance,  though  it  may  not 
have  been  so  regarded  before.  In  the  case  of  a 
mode,  this  again  is  not  true ;  for  the  uniting  prin- 
ciple here  is  not  that  of  contiguity  and  causation, 
or  if  it  so  appears,  it  is  not  the  foundation  of  the 
complex  idea,  as  in  the  cases  of  the  dance  and 
beauty,  both  of  which,  according  to  the  definition, 
are  modes. 

In  his  attack  upon  substance,  we  haive  seen 
Hume  following  in  the  wake  of  Locke  and 
Berkeley;  but  in  each  case  he  has  plainly  extended 
their  endeavors.  Locke,  though  he  strongly  em- 
phasized the  mind  and  its  activity,  never  got  past 
the  notion  of  substance  as  the  carrier  of  primary 
qualities.  Berkeley  demolished  the  conception  of 
corporeal  substance ;  matter  for  him  is  a  mere  ab- 
straction. From  Hume's  discussion  of  substance, 


122  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

wherein  he  made  it  clear  that  certain  qualities  at 
the  liberty  of  mind,  or  on  its  motion,  may  or  may 
not  be  qualities  adhering  in  the  substance,  it  be- 
comes quite  clear  that  the  union  of  qualities  for 
him  is  not  explained  in  terms  of  a  substance  that 

.  bears  them  but  in  terms  of  mental  habit.  It  is  the 
mind  that  unites  and  holds  in  union  the  simple 
ideas  that  constitute  a  substance.  As  Hume's 
contributions  at  this  point  are  far  from  insig- 
nificant for  the  future  history  of  philosophy  it 
may  not  be  amiss  to  go  into  them  at  greater 
detail. 

Hume,  as  we  have  seen  above,  followed  with 
great  interest  Berkeley's  attack  upon  abstraction. 
Here,  as  well  as  in  his  Theory  of  Vision,  he  found 

-  Berkeley  setting  forth  the  part  that  custom  plays 
in  building  up  mind.  It  cannot  be  said  that  either 
Hobbes  or  Locke  failed  to  appreciate  to  some  ex- 
tent the  significance  of  habit  for  mind.  Locke 
certainly  recognized  it  in  its  ill  effects  upon  the 
mind ;  Hobbes  gave  full  place  to  it  in  setting  forth 
his  theory  of  mental  phenomena  under  the  head  of 
trains  of  thought.  But  it  is  to  Berkeley's  credit 
that  he  was  the  first  to  clearly  set  forth  the  prin- 
ciple. Though  it  is  quite  questionable  whether 
Berkeley  fully  understood  the  tremendous  signifi- 
cance of  his  discovery.  His  preconceptions  were 
such  that  it  was  hardly  possible  for  him  to  do  so. 
It  was,  then,  left  to  Hume  to  bring  into  complete 
clearness  this  principle.  In  doing  so,  he  opens  the 
question  whether  it  is  not  wise  to  extend  the  sub- 


HUME:   CRITICAL  posnm>\;.  123 

jective  coherence  that  Locke  referred  to ;  whether 
the  principle  of  causality  which  his  predecessors 
had  assumed  may  not  also  come  under  the  head  of 
subjective  coherence,  i.  e.,  be  an  association  of 
ideas  gained  from  experience. 

Take  for  example  causation.  The  idea  of  cause 
must  be  derived  from  some  relation  among  objects. 
On  examination  we  find  that  the  relation  of  con- 
tiguity is  essential  to  that  of  causation ;  but  while 
this  is  true,  it  by  no  means  constitutes  causation, 
since  there  are  many  cases  of  this  relation  in  which 
there  is  not  present  any  causation.  There  is  a 
necessary  connection  that  must  be  taken  into  con- 
sideration; this  necessary  connection,  it  may  be 
said,  is  the  very  essence  of  causation.  The  best 
that  can  be  got  at  in  this  investigation  into  the  na- 
ture of  causation  is  that  there  exists  in  the  mind 
an  expectation  that  certain  phenomena  will  follow 
certain  other  phenomena;  and  this  expectation 
comes  of  our  experience.  Causation,  therefore, 
reduces  itself  to  a  matter  of  habit  and  custom. 

(A  cause  is)  "an  object  precedent  and  contiguous  to 
another  and  so  united  with  it  in  the  imagination,  that  the 
idea  of  the  one  determines  the  mind  to  form  the  idea  of 
the  other,  and  the  impression  of  the  one  to  form  a  more 
lively  idea  of  the  other."  C1) 

What  it  is  that  causes  one  thing  to  follow  another ; 
why  one  idea  is  led  by  a  "  gentle  force ' '  to  call  up 
another  in  our  imagination, — these  are  both  alike 


A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Bk.  1,  Part  III,  Sec.  XIV,  p. 
172. 


124  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

inexplicable.  The  law  of  causation  cannot  be  es- 
tablished logically;  there  is  no  contradiction  in 
saying  that  a  thing  originates  without  a  cause. 
Nor  does  an  appeal  to  intuition  render  such  a  rela- 
tion valid.  Thus  are  brushed  aside  the  proofs  of 
predecessors  and  contemporaries,  and  Hume  is 
said  to  have  established  the  genuine  problem  of 
causality, — his  marvelous  contribution  to  thought. 
The  significance  of  this  conclusion  is  realized  on 
reflection.  If  knowledge  is  of  two  kinds,  as  Leib- 
nitz put  it,  knowledge  of  reason  and  of  matter  of 
fact;  why,  what  we  know  of  the  latter  is  based 
upon  the  causal  law  and  the  other  is  really  negligi- 
ble in  comparison.  To  a  pragmatist,  of  course,  it 
matters  little  whether  the  causal  law  be  established 
or  not ;  if  it  holds  good,  why  then  it  does  hold  good 
and  we  may  say  that  just  in  so  far  it  is  a  true  rela- 
tion. In  this  respect  as  well  as  in  others  Hume 
was  a  good  pragmatist.  For  it  must  be  understood 
that  he  never  doubted  for  one  moment  but  that  to 
proceed  on  such  trust  would  yield  fruitful  results. 
This  has  a  close  relation  to  his  emphasis  upon  the 
value  of  the  study  of  mind.  For,  as  our  author 
puts  it  later  in  his  Inquiry : 

"When  we  say,  therefore,  that  one  object  is  connected 
with  another,  we  mean  only  that  they  have  acquired  a 
connexion  in  our  thought,  and  give  rise  to  this  inference, 
by  which  they  become  proofs  of  each  other's  existence:  A 
conclusion  which  is  somewhat  extraordinary,  but  which 
seems  founded  on  sufficient  evidence." (*) 


Inquiry  Concerning  Human  Understanding.  Sec.  7,  Part  II, 
p.  76. 


HUME:  CRITICAL  POSITIVISM.  125 

Humean  skepticism,  if  one  chooses  to  give  it 
such  a  name,  could  never  result  in  such  stagna- 
tion of  human  inquiry  as  is  by  common  report  said 
to  have  resulted  from  the  skeptical  position  of  an- 
cient philosophers;  which  leads  to  the  suggestion 
that  that  stagnation  may  have  been  due  rather  to 
wars  and  rumors  of  wars. 

There  are,  however,  passages  in  Hume's  writ- 
ings that  lead  one  to  believe  that  he  himself  took 
very  seriously  his  analysis  of  this  abstraction  of 
our  experience;  a  thing  that  is  quite  remarkable 
and  noteworthy.  Why  should  Hume,  of  all  men, 
after  having  made  so  clear  that  our  habits  of  mind 
<°re  due  to  our  experience,  worry  so  over  this  ab- 
straction of  the  uniformity  of  all  our  experience! 
The  answer  lies  in  the  fact  that  he  emphasized  the 
atomistic  character  of  our  experience,  the  sepa- 
rateness  of  single  states  of  consciousness,  out  of 
proportion  to  the  emphasis  that  he  placed  upon  the 
continuity  of  experience.  The  cause  cannot  be  sep- 
arated from  the  effect;  they  are  a  continuous 
whole.  But  no  one  knew  this  better  than  Hume. 

And  yet  we  mark  this  same  disposition  to  em- 
phasize the  discreetness  of  experience  in  his  search 
after  the  soul;  separate  states  of  consciousness  far 
outweigh  for  him  that  experience  of  identity  that 
is  ever  back  of  them.  It  was  in  this  way  that  he 
is  said  to  have  demolished  the  idea  of  spiritual  sub- 
stance. 

"If  any  impression  gives  rise  to  the  idea  of  self  that  im- 
pression   must   continue    invariably   the   same,   thro'   the 


126  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN    ENGLAND. 

whole  course  of  our  lives;  since  self  is  suppos'd  to  exist 
after  that  manner.  But  there  is  no  impression  constant 
and  invariable.  Pain  and  pleasure,  grief  and  joy,  passions 
and  sensations  succeed  each  other,  and  never  all  exist  at 
the  same  time.  It  cannot,  therefore,  be  from  any  of  these 
impressions,  or  from  any  other,  that  the  idea  of  self  is 
deriv'd;  and  consequently  there  is  no  such  idea.  *  *  * 
For  my  part,  when  I  enter  most  intimately  into  what  1 
call  myself,  I  always  stumble  upon  some  particular  per- 
ception or  other,  of  heat  or  cold,  light  or  shade,  love  or 
hatred,  pain  or  pleasure.  I  can  never  catch  myself  at  any 
time  without  a  perception,  and  can  never  observe  anything 
fcut  the  perception.  *  *  *  And  were  all  my  percep- 
tions remov'd  by  death,  and  cou'd  I  neither  think,  nor  feel, 
nor  see,  nor  love,  nor  hate,  after  the  dissolution  of  my 
body  I  should  be  entirely  annihilated  nor  do  I  conceive 
what  is  further  requisite  to  make  me  a  perfect  non- 
entity." D 

May  we  not  with  justice  say  that  Hume  here 
again,  to  use  a  figure  from  mathematics,  lays  the 
stress  upon  the  points  to  the  exclusion  of  his  ex- 
perience of  the  whole  line.  But  Hume  may  well 
answer  in  that  case,  and  with  warrant  that  is  de- 
nied him  in  the  case  of  the  principle  of  causality, 
that  these  separate  states  are  just  what  he  does  ex- 
perience. This  is  quite  true  and  the  law  of  asso- 
ciation is  the  best  formal  explanation  of  their 
union  in  the  imagination.  But  is  there  not  a  real 
principle  back  of  the  formal  one;  otherwise  how 
is  it  when  I  wake  up  in  the  morning  that  my  ex- 
perence  of  yesterday  is  hitched  on  to  that  of  to- 
day? That  is,  unless  Hume  gives  me  a  body  in 
which  to  carry  these  experiences,  which  he  cannot 
consistently  do.  It  is  but  fair  that  it  be  borne  in 
mind,  however,  that  the  self  that  Hume  here  at- 
tacks is  the  scholastic  soul  substance. 


O)  A  Treatise  of  Human  Nature,  Part  IV,  Sec.  VI,  p.  251. 


HUME:   CRITICAL  POSITIVISM.  127 

The  question  here  raised  by  Hume  however,  is 
of  fundamental  importance.  In  what  terms  shall 
we  look  at  the  world!  As  the  causal  principal 
turns  out  to  be  a  mere  habit_ofjpaiiid,  giving  us  at 
bottom  a  discontinuous  world  of  reality;  so  the 
spiritual  substance  of  Berkeley  proves  also  to 
be  a  mere  creation  of  the  imagination,  leav- 
ing us  as  mind  a  mere  flux  of  separate 
images.  The  idea  of  power  in  the  one  case 
(causation)  as  the  idea  of  power  in  the  other 
case  (will,  mind)  are  but  habits  of  mind.  If 
Hume  was  the  first  to  set  forth  this  theory  of  caus- 
ation, he  was  not  the  first  to  maintain  that  will  is 
not  really  a  power ;  for  this  we  saw  to  be  the  true 
Hobbistic  position.  But  Hume  would  deduce  what 
Hobbes  merely  stated  with  dogmatic  emphasis. 
The  question  is  still  an  open  one.  There  are  those 
who  claim  that  the  term  will  still  deserves  a  place 
in  both  psychology  and  metaphysics;  that  the  fact 
that  the  will  is  not  a  subject  of  observation  need 
not  be  prejudicial  to  its  case,  or  interfere  with  the 
fruitfulness  of  the  use  of  such  a  term.  For  no 
more  can  be  said  in  favor  of  energy  and  motion; 
it  is  only  their  effects,  not  their  essence,  that  we 
see  and  know. 

After  Hume  has  made  his  case,  what  has  he  left? 
Nothing  but  two  streams  of  experience.  Whence, 
then,  all  this  world  of  our  experience?  What  is 
it,  according  to  Hume,  that  has  given  ns  these  con- 
cepts of  causality,  substance,  self, — the  ordered 
external  world!  The  imagination.  It  is  this  fac- 


128  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS    IN   ENGLAND. 

ulty  that  has  given  us  the  Lockean  bearer  of  the 
qualities  of  things,  that  leads  us  to  believe  in  those 
things  that  are  not  present  to  sensation,  to  infer 
the  future  existence  of  the  chick  from  the  egg,  to 
conceive  of  an  indivisible,  immaterial  soul,  or 
mind, —  to  put  the  matter  briefly,  it  is  this  faculty 
that  leads  us  to  believe  in  the  existence  of  an  or- 
dered external  world  and  all  that  it  has  for  us,  as 
Berkeley  had  already  shown  us ;  as  well  as  to  be- 
lieve in  the  existence  of  the  world  within,  which 
is  Hume's  own  contribution.  There  is  a  sugges- 
tion from  nature,  whereby  we  gain  our  experience, 
and  the  imagination  does  the  rest.  This  great  uni- 
formity of  nature  as  well  as  this  continuity  of  our 
inner  experience  are  alike  the  results  of  the  magi- 
cal activity  of  this  faculty. 

For,  says  Hume,  if  we  look  our  experiences 
squarely  in  the  face,  must  we  not  openly  confess 
that  they  are  singularly  discontinuous  and  inco- 
herent when  compared  with  what  we  read  into 
them.  It  is  this  disposition  of  the'  mind  to  read 
things  into  nature  that  had  been  declared  a  weak- 
ness of  mankind  by  Bacon,  who  so  wisely  cautioned 
us  against  its  wiles.  It  was  this  same  faculty 
that  had  been  noticed  by  Locke;  that  had  been 
made  the  most  fundamental  thing  in  the  universe 
by  Berkeley,  and  that  was  yet  to  play  the  most 
significant  role  ever  played  by  any  faculty  in  the 
transcendental  philosophy  of  Kant, — it  is  before 
this  faculty  and  its  magical  works  that  Hume 
stands  appalled.  Hume  never  pretends  to  get 


HUME:   CRITICAL,  POSITIVISM.  121> 

around  mental  union.  Nothing  is  clearer  than 
this.  He  attacks  time  and  again  these  creations 
of  the  mind,  not  to  deny  that  they  are  creations  of 
the  mind,  but  to  make  clear  that  they  are  just  this 
and  no  more.  And  yet,  oddly  enough,  Hume's 
most  earnest  efforts  seem  to  be  devoted  to  an  en- 
deavor to  undermine  belief  in  that  with  which  he 
was  continually  confronted,  a  uniting  mind. 

It  was  left  Kant  to  about-face.  And  this  is 
how  it  is  that  Kantianism  came  to  be, — how  his 
Copernican  revolution  came  about.  It  had  already 
been  made  possible,  and  Kant  felt  imperative,  by 
Hume.  It  was  an  easy  matter  for  Kant  to  restore 
to  confidence,  the  ego,  his  transcedental  unity  of 
apperception,  which  happens  to  be  a  new  name 
for  Hume's  faculty  of  the  imagination, — and  then 
to  tell  us  in  ambiguous  German  how  it  is  that 
macht  zwar  Verstand  die  Natur,  aber  er  schafft 
fie  niclit. 


CONCLUSION. 


CONCLUSION. 

In  the  foregoing  studies  we  have  traced  the 
gradual  development  of  the  conception  of  the 
uniting  mind. 

In  Hobbes  the  mind  was  regarded  as  the  prod- 
uct of  experience,  the  essential  function  of  which 
was  that  it  preserved  our  experience.  His  posi- 
tion we  saw  was  not  so  different  from  that  of 
present-day  teachers;  the  mind  is  an  organ  of 
behavior  that  lifts  man  out  of  the  slavery  of  his 
immediate  environment,  enabling  him  to  react  to 
stimuli  not  merely  for  the  present.  No  stress 
was  laid  upon  the  theoretical  problems  of  episte- 
mology. 

Locke,  as  we  have  seen,  while  in  many  respects 
advancing  the  cause  of  psychology,  defends  the 
conception  of  the  mind  as  an  entity  above  and 
opposed  to  matter.  While  he  laid  no  great  stress 
upon  the  atomistic  character  of  our  experience, 
he  emphasized  very  much  the  representative 
theory  of  knowledge,  the  doctrine  that  the  mind 
knows  not  external  objects,  but  ideas  whose 
appearance  depends  entirely  upon  the  mind's 
activity, — unless  the  mind  attends  there  is  no  per- 
ception. Qualities  are  carried  by  substance,  just 
as  ideas  are  united  in  the  thinking  substance.  The 
mind  is  not  the  product  of  experience,  as  taught 
by  Hobbes,  but  the  materials  of  thought  are.  The 
essential  function  of  mind  for  Locke  is  the  organ- 


134  IDEALISTIC    BEGINNINGS   IN   ENGLAND. 

ization  of  these  materials  into  the  fabric  of  knowl- 
edge. This  organizing  activity  of  mind  was  not, 
as  in  the  case  of  Hobbes,  the  subject  of  causal  ex- 
planation. The  processes  of  mental  operations 
were  described  in  his  discussion  of  natural  facul- 
ties, but  the  nature  of  the  mind's  activity  is  sui 
generis. 

Berkeley  again  advances  the  causes  of  psychol- 
ogy, unconsciously  bringing  to  great  clearness  the 
true  nature  of  mind, — the  tendency  of  one  expe- 
rience to  call  up  another.  But  while  this  is  so, 
through  his  attack  upon  abstract  ideas  he  under- 
mined the  doctrine  of  substance;  the  union  of 
qualities,  therefore,  which  for  Locke  was  ex- 
plained in  terms  of  substance,  had  now  to  be  ex- 
plained in  terms  of  spiritual  substance.  What- 
ever union  there  is,  whether  in  nature  or  in  mind, 
is  due  to  the  same  uniting  priciple.  Esse  is 
percipi. 

Hume  even  more  than  Berkeley  emphasized  the 
discreteness  of  our  experience.  What  we  expe- 
rience is  singularly  discontinuous  when  compared 
with  what  we  read  into  it.  The  order  and  co- 
herence of  nature  arises  out  of  the  activity  of 
the  imagination.  But  what  this  uniting  principle 
is  and  how  it  behaves  are  just  as  inexplicable 
mysteries  as  the  law  of  cause  and  effect.  This 
is  Hume's  theoretical  position,  although  prac- 
tically he  betrayed  a  strong  leaning  towards 
mechanism.  Kantianism  is  a  positive  (i.  e. 


CONCLUSION.  135 

opposed  to  negative  and  sceptical)  and  system- 
atic re-statement  of  Hume's  position.  Passage 
after  passage  might  be  cited  to  prove  this  state- 
ment, but  it  can  be  made  clear  by  a  single  cita- 
tion: 

"However  strange,  therefore,  it  may  appear  at  first,  It 
must  nevertheless  have  become  clear  by  this  time  that  the 
affinity  of  phenomena  and  with  it  their  association,  and 
through  that,  lastly,  their  reproduction  also  according  to 
laws,  that  is,  the  whole  of  our  experience,  becomes  pos- 
sible only  by  means  of  that  transcendental  function  of  im- 
agination, without  which  no  concepts  of  objects  could  ever 
come  together  in  one  experience."  (x) 


(')  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Transcendental  Analytic,  Sec.  III.. 


VITA. 

The  author  of  the  foregoing  studies,  John  Pickett  Turner, 
is  the  son  of  the  Reverend  William  Allen  Turner  and  Mary 
Jane  Pickett.  He  was  born  May  5,  1876,  at  Cedar  Hill,  Ten- 
nessee. After  elementary  training  in  public  and  private 
schools,  he  was  sent  to  the  Webb  School,  Bellbuckle,  Tennessee, 
where  he  was  prepared  for  college.  During  1896-7  he  engaged 
in  secondary  work.  In  September,  1897,  he  entered  Vander- 
bilt  University,  Nashville,  Tennessee;  the  requirements  for 
the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts  were  completed  June,  1900. 
For  the  year  following,  1900-'01,  he  was  appointed  Scholastic 
Fellow  in  Vanderbilt  University.  During  the  tenure  of  this 
fellowship  he  took  courses  in  Classical  Philology  under 
Chancellor  J.  H.  Kirkland  and  Professor  H.  C.  Tolman;  in 
Old  English  under  Dr.  B.  M.  Drake,  and  in  Literature  under 
Professor  Richard  Jones  under  whose  direction  his  Master's 
thesis  was  written.  In  June,  1901,  he  received  the  degree  of 
Master  of  Arts.  During  1901-3  he  taught  in  Secondary  Schools 
of  Atlanta,  Georgia.  June,  1903,  he  joined  Mr.  A.  H.  Hughey, 
of  Vanderbilt  University,  in  establishing  the  Hughey  &  Turner 
School  at  Weatherford,  Texas.  September,  1907,  in  accord- 
ance with  his  plan,  he  gave  up  Secondary  Education  to  enter 
Columbia  University.  At  this  institution  his  work  has  been 
in  the  Departments  of  Philosophy  and  Psychology.  He  has 
taken  courses  under  Professors  John  Dewey,  F.  J.  E.  Wood- 
bridge,  G.  S.  Fullerton,  W.  P.  Montague,  J.  M.  Cattell,  R.  S. 
Woodworth,  D.  S.  Miller,  A.  O.  Lovejoy,  Dr.  W.  T.  Bush  and 
Dr.  H.  C.  Brown.  In  February,  1908,  he  was  appointed  Tutor 
in  Mathematics  in  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York.  The 
present  studies  were  written  under  the  direction  of  Professor 
Frederick  J.  E.  Woodbridge. 


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